Active repair technology applied to delaminated composite structures

Abstract

The main target of the present paper is represented by the fracture mechanics charac-terization of delaminated composite structures actively repaired through piezoelectric patches. A boundary element code, formulated for anisotropic piezoelectric solids, including, as limiting case, the applicability to linear elastic anisotropic materials has been then imple-mented. The modeling of the delaminated composite structures as well as of the assembled structures, made of the damaged components and the patches, has been achieved through the multidomain technique. Moreover, to take into account for the adhesive layer between the host structures and the piezoelectric patches, a "spring-model" has been also implemented. The BE code has been validated for the analysis of cracked isotropic structures repaired through active patches. Then it has been applied to study the electromechanical performances of piezoelectric devices used to actively repair delaminated composite components. Numerical analyses performed on a drop-ply delaminated composite structures by varying the patch con-figurations as well as the repair positioning have provided useful information on the applica-tion of the active repair technology.