Author : Shailesh L. Deshmukh, Prashant Kumar, R. N. Ladhave and Prashant Patane

A FRP butt-joint was developed between two adherends of aluminium pipes of outside diameter 25.5 mm, inside diameter 22 mm and length 175 mm. The joint was formed by winding wetted roving of carbon fiber with controlled quantity of epoxy at ±45° angle. It was cured to form the joint with CFRP working as a sleeve. The joint was simulated using ANSYS software, for two kinds of loading i) tensile loading and ii) flexural loading. Under a four point bend test with thin CFRP sleeve (n = 80), the failure occurred at the maximum load of 3470 N, due to breakage of CFRP at the joint plane. When the CFRP sleeve was made thicker (n=150), the aluminium adherend failed due to formation of plastic hinges in the aluminium adherends outside the CFRP sleeve.

Keywords: FRP, adherends, Flexural, CFRP, ANSYS etc.