Analysis of the behaviour of adhesive composite repairs subjected to static loads

Abstract

Aircraft structural components made of composite materials are susceptible of being damaged during their service life. The high level of integration and large size of these structural components may make very difficult the replacement of damaged parts; thus, repair damaged components is a solution that can save economic and temporal costs. Adhesively-bonded repairs offer certain advantages when compared to mechanical repairs, therefore there is an increasing interest in the study of their mechanical response to static loads, and a detailed structural analysis depend on several parameters. In this work, a finite-element numerical model was developed in Abaqus/Explicit commercial code. The model was validated experimentally. The numerical model was used to analyse the mechanical response of patch repaired laminates subjected to tensile static loads. The effect of the repair patch shape (rectangular or circular) and repair patch size on the failure load and  elastic stiffness  was evaluated by carrying out a series of virtual tests using the validated numerical model.

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