Effect of Temperature on the Quasi-static Strength and Fatigue Resistance of Bonded Composite Double Lap Joints

Abstract Fibre reinforced polymer composites (FRP's) are often used to reduce the weight of a structure. Traditionally the composite parts are bolted together; however, increased weight savings can often be achieved by adhesive bonding or co-curing the parts. The reason that these methods are often not used for structural applications is due to the lack of trusted design methods and concerns about long-term performance. The authors have attempted to address these issues by studying the effects of fatigue loading, test environment and pre-conditioning on bonded composite joints. Previous work centered on the lap-strap joint which was representative of the long-overlap joints common in aerospace structures. However, it was recognised that in some applications short-overlap joints will be used and these joints might behave quite differently. In this work, double-lap joints were tested both quasi-statically and in fatigue across the temperature range experienced by a jet aircraft. Two variants on the double-lap joint sample were used for the testing, one with multidirectional (MD) CFRP adherends and the other with unidirectional (UD) CFRP adherends. Finite element analysis was used to analyse stresses in the joints. It was seen that as temperature increased both the quasi-static strength and fatigue resistance decreased. The MD joints were stronger at low temperatures and the UD joints stronger at high temperatures. It was proposed that this was because at low temperature the strength was determined by the peak stresses in the joints, whereas, at high temperatures, strength is controlled by creep of the joints which is determined by the minimum stresses in the joint. This argument was supported by the stress analysis.