Glass Fibre/Epoxy Resin Interface Life-Time Prediction.
Abstract
The principle of fibre reinforcement requires load transfer from matrix to fibres. In resin matrix composites it is known, from measurements of mechanical strength, that realisation of load transfer is progressively impaired during water uptake from humid in-service environments. The physical mechanisms responsible for this impairment include the generation of interfacial pressure pockets, the occurrence of which suggests that the optical waveguide behaviour of glass reinforced plastics should be affected and might therefore offer a non destructive evaluation technique for monitoring at least one of the causes of mechanical degradation. This possibility has been appraised and experimentally verified. Two models have been developed and applied to interfacial fracture at pressure pockets attributable to osmosis. Direct photoelastic measurements indicative of load transfer in short fibre composites have been used to test the rates of debonding predicted by the two models. The net stress across the boundary of the first Wigner cell in a fibre reinforced composite must be zero from which it is inferred that, moving around a fibre, the radial principal stress changes sign several times.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 01, 1982
- Accession Number
- ADA116356
Entities
People
- Elizabeth Walter
- J. P. Sargent
- K. H. G. Ashbee
- N. R. Farrar
Organizations
- University of Bristol