High rate loading of hybrid joints in a Split Hopkinson Tension Bar

Fraunhofer Institute for High-Speed Dynamics, Ernst-Mach-Institut, EMI, Freiburg, Germany

^* Corresponding author: Noah.Ledford@emi.fraunhofer.de

Published online: 7 September 2018

Abstract

Bonded joints are nowadays seen as one of the preferred joining methods in aerospace applications. However, the difficulty in certifying bond strength and the relatively low energy absorption capability of the joint are barriers to widespread adoption. The use of a hybrid joint, that is, the combination of a mechanical and a bonded joint, allows for a fail-safe design and offers improved performance of the joint. The quasi-static properties of hybrid joints have been investigated by a number of researchers. In contrast, the high rate loading regime has been only sparsely investigated. In this work, hybrid joints are tested in quasi-static and high rate loading in order to analyze their loading rate dependence. The hybrid joint studied is a composite-aluminum double lap shear joint with Sikaforce 7752 adhesive and Hi-Lite-315 countersunk titanium bolts. In order to quantitatively analyze the high rate behavior of the hybrid joints and their respective sub-components, additional tests are carried out on simply bonded and simply bolted specimens. The high rate characterization was performed with a Split Hopkinson Tension Bar. The main challenges for these tests are the relatively large specimen size and complex specimen geometry needed to properly characterize the joint behavior, which both are in contradiction with the assumptions of the classical Split Hopkinson Bar-analysis. In this paper we describe an approach to solve these challenges based on an elastic wave analysis of the system.