• Journal of Adhesion and Interface
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.22-36
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• 2004

Several in-situ testing methods of adhesively bonded joints under static short-time tensile loading are critically analyzed in terms of experimental procedure and data evaluation. Due to its rather homogeneous stress state across the glue line, the tensile-shear test with thick single-lap specimens, according to ISO 11003-2, has become the most important test process for the determination of realistic materials parameters. This basic method, which was improved in both, the experimental part by stepped adherends and easily attachable extensometers and the evaluation procedure by numeric substrate deformation correction and test simulation based on the finite element method (FEM), is therefore demonstrated by application to several kinds of adhesives and metallic adherends. Multi-axial load decreases the strength of a joint. This effect, which is illustrated by an experimental comparison, impedes the derivation of realistic mechanical characteristics from measured force-displacement curves. It is shown by numeric modeling that tensile-shear tests with thin plate substrates according to ISO 4587, which are widely used for quick industrial quality assurance, reveal an inhomogeneous stress state, especially because of relatively large adherend deformation. Complete experimental determination of the elastic properties of bonded joints requires independent measurement of at least two characteristics. As the thick-adherend tensile-shear test directly yields the shear modulus, the tensile butt-joint test according to ISO 6922 represents the most obvious complement of the test programme. Thus, validity of analytical correction formulae proposed in literature for the derivation of realistic materials characteristics is verified by numeric simulation. Moreover, the influence of the substrate deformation is examined and a FEM correction method introduced.

• Journal of Adhesion and Interface
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.14-26
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• 2004

For reliable determination of mechanical characteristics of adhesively bonded joints used e.g. as input data for computer-aided design of complex components, the thick-adherend tensile-shear test according to ISO 11003-2 is the most important material testing method. Although the total displacement of the joint is measured across the polymer layer directly in the overlap zone in order to minimize the influence of the stepped adherends, the substrate deformation must be taken into account within the framework of the evaluation of the shear modulus and the maximum shear strain, at least when high-strength adhesives are applied. In the standard ISO 11003-2 version of 1993, it was prescribed to perform the substrate deformation correction by means of testing a one-piece reference specimen. The authors, however, pointed to the excessive demands on the measuring accuracy of the extensometers connected with this technique in industrial practice and alternatively proposed a numerical deformation analysis of a dummy specimen. This idea of a mathematical correction was included in the revised ISO 11003-2 version of 2001 but in the simplified form of an analytical method based on Hooke's law of elasticity for small strains. In the present work, it is shown that both calculation techniques yield considerably discordant results. As experimental assessment would require high-precision distance determination (e.g. laser extensometer), finite element analyses of the deformation behavior of the bonded joint are performed in order to estimate the accuracy of the obtained substrate deformation corrections. These simulations reveal that the numerical correction technique based on the finite element deformation modeling of the reference specimen leads to considerably more realistic results.