A COMPARATIVE INVESTIGATION OF ADHESIVELY BONDED AND TEMPORARILY- FASTENED COMPOSITE JOINTS

Abstract

FRPs due to their number of advantages are employed for a number of applications these days. In any product, there are generally several parts or components joined together to make the complete assembly. The purpose of a joint is to transfer loads from one member to another, or to create relative motion between two members. Hence, the strength of a joint is an issue. In the present work the joints with different adherend geometries viz. offset and double offset, were analysed and failure load results were compared with the failure load of single lap joint, under similar loading conditions, to find out the best joint geometry. Two types of materials viz. Glass fiber reinforced plastic (GFRP) and Carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP), were used. Firstly, GFRP joints prepared with the use of HUNTSMAN adhesive were analysed experimentally for the tensile failure load and the results were validated with the finite element analysis. Further, the analysis was extended for the CFRP joints (prepared with the HUNTSMAN adhesive) with the FEA. It was analysed that the CFRP joints take more tensile load to failure than that of the GFRP joints, for the HUNTSMAN adhesive. To design the joint of optimum strength, two more adhesives, EPOTEK 301-2 and HYSOL were selected, former having the strength more than that of the HUNTSMAN adhesive and later being less strong. CFRP joints prepared with all the three types of adhesives were also analysed for the compressive loading.