Ultrasonic polar scan imaging of fatigued fiber reinforced composites

This study extends the use of both the amplitude and time-of-flight based pulsed ultrasonic polar scan (P-UPS) towards the inspection of damaged composite materials, more specifically fatigued carbon fabric reinforced thermoplastics (CETEX). The results demonstrate the excellent capability of the P-UPS method for nondestructively assessing and quantifying both shear-dominated and tension-tension fatigue damage in fabric reinforced plastics. The P-UPS results indicate that shear-dominated fatigued CETEX goes with a reduction of shear properties combined with large fiber distortions up to 13°. The P-UPS results of the tensiontension fatigued CETEX samples on the other hand reveal a directional degradation of the stiffness properties, reaching a maximum reduction of 12.8% along the loading direction. The P-UPS extracted damage characteristics are fully supported by simulations, conventional destructive tests as well as visual inspection.

ISBN:9788461697984

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