Author : Saeid Abazary, Bahman Abazary, Mohammad Amin Khalafi, Reza Aghaie and Morteza Shateri

In this study, acoustic emission (AE) monitoring with a Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) clustering is developed to detect the delamination process buckling test on glass/plolyester composite materials. The main fracture mode that should be emphasized and has an effect on the residual strength of composite materials is delamination. In this work, two types of specimen at different layups, [0,90]6s and unidirectional [0]6s, leading to different levels of damage evolution, were studied. Using acoustic emission monitoring can help to detect these fracture mechanisms. The obtained AE signals were classified using FCM. Two parameters (Peak Frequency and ABS Energy) were used to validate the FCM based classification. The results show that there is a good agreement with the FCM classification and microscopic observation by SEM.

Keywords: Acoustic emission, Buckling, Fuzzy C-Means Clustering, Failure Mechanisms.

Article published in International Journal of Current  Engineering  and Technology, Vol.2,No.4 (Dec- 2012)