STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES

COMPOSITES
PARTICLE REINFORCED
LargeParticle
Structural Composites

FIBER REINFORCED
Continuous (aligned)
Discontinuous (short)

STRUCTURAL

Laminates

DispersedStrengthened

Sandwich Panels

Aligned

Randomly Oriented
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Jeanger Labayen

STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
Structural Composites composed of both homogeneous and composite materials.
Properties of such composites depend not only on the properties of the constituent materials but also on the geometrical design of the various structural elements.
Structural Composites

Two most common structural composites: 1. Laminar 2. Sandwich panels

STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Laminar composites
- Composed of two-dimensional sheets or panels that have a preferred high-strength direction such as found in wood and continuous/aligned fiber-reinforced plastics.

Structural Composites

The layers are stacked (stacking of successive oriented, fiber reinforced layers) and subsequently cemented together such that the orientation of the high-strength direction varies with each successive layer.
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STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Laminar composites
Example: adjacent wood sheets in plywood are aligned with the grain direction at right angles to each other.
Laminations may be constructed using fabric material such as cotton, paper or woven glass fibers embedded in a plastic matrix.

Structural Composites

Properties: Laminar composites has relatively high strength in a number of directions in the twodimensional plane.
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STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
Consists of two strong outer sheets or faces separated by a layer of less-dense material, or core, which has lower stiffness and lower strength. Consists of sandwiching a core material between two thin outer layers are commonly used in engineering design.
Structural Composites

THE FACE The faces bear most of the in-plane loading, and any transverse bending stresses. Typical face materials include aluminum alloys, fiberreinforced plastics, titanium, steel, and plywood.
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STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
THE CORE
Structurally, the core serves two functions: 1. it separates the faces and resists deformations perpendicular to the face plane. 2. it provides a certain degree of shear rigidity along planes that are perpendicular to the faces.

Structural Composites

Typical core materials include foamed polymers, synthetic rubbers, inorganic cements, as well as balsa wood.
Another popular core consists of a honeycomb structure.
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STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
Two types of sandwich structures: 1. Honeycomb sandwich 2. Cladded sandwich
Honeycomb structure consists of thin foils that have been formed into interlocking hexagonal cells, with axes oriented perpendicular to the face planes. Bonded honeycomb sandwich construction has been used as a basic construction material in the aerospace industry for over 30 years. Most aircraft flying today depend on this construction material. Most honeycomb in use today is made of aluminum alloys such as 5052 and 2024 or glass-reinforced phenolic, glass-reinforced polyester, and aramid-fiber-reinforced materials.

Structural Composites

STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
Aluminum honeycomb panels are fabricated by adhesively bonding aluminum alloys face sheets to aluminum alloy honeycomb core sections. This type of construction provides stiff, rigid, and light-weight sandwich panel.
Structural Composites

STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
Cladded metal structures:
The thin outer metals are hot-roll-bonded to the inner core metal to form metallurgical (atomic diffusion) bonds between the outside layers and the inner core metal. Used to produce composites of a metal core with thin outer layers of another metal or metals.

Structural Composites

STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
Cladded metal structure has many applications in industry. For example: 1. High-strength aluminum alloys such as 2024 and 7075 have relatively poor corrosion resistance and can be protected by a thin layer of soft, highly corrosion-resistant aluminum cladding. 1. The use of expensive metals to protect a lessexpensive metal core. For example, the U.S. 10 and 25 coins have a caldding of a Cu-25% Ni alloy over a core of less-expensive copper.
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Structural Composites

STRUCTURAL COMPOSITES
1. Sandwich panels
Sandwich panels are found in a wide variety of applications:

Structural Composites

- roofs - floors - walls

Buildings

- wings - fuselage - tailplane skins

Aircraft

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