Abstract
A self-piercing riveting process is used to join a thermoplastic composite sheet of PA6.6-GF50 with an aluminum alloy sheet 5182 O. Two shapes of self-piercing rivet are tested: the countersunk rivet and the button head rivet. Non-destructive inspections by pulse thermography and post-mortem cross-section observations are made to assess the damage that might have occurred during the rivet piercing process. The manufacturing defects are characterized and the possible causes for their emergence are explained. Then, single-lap joint tests were carried out to determine the best joint in terms of its mechanical strength. These tests were also instrumented by various monitoring techniques such as passive thermography, digital image correlation, and acoustic emission to clarify the joint damaging behavior. Non-destructive inspections by pulse thermography are finally correlated with the thermal fields acquired by passive thermography during the mechanical test to improve the understanding of the damage mechanisms and their criticality.
Highlights
Environment regulations related to CO2 emissions involve the development of lightweight structures in the automotive industry
This section is dedicated to the experimental results acquired during the three following steps: initial micrographic cross-section observations and pulse thermography tests to detect possible manufacturing defects; single-lap joint (SLJ) tests, monitored by the previously introduced techniques; final pulse thermography tests to locate the most critical post mechanical loading damage
Small defects are visible, which should not be detected by nondestructive inspections given their geometric extensions lower than 1 mm. This point will be checked by pulse thermography tests
Summary
Environment regulations related to CO2 emissions involve the development of lightweight structures in the automotive industry. Thanks to their good stiffness to weight ratio, composites can be used to replace some metal components for weight reduction purposes. Arenas et al (2013) and Seong et al (2008) join aluminum alloy with CFRP by adhesive bonding. This technique requires surface preparation and curing cycles implying a long processing time. No non-destructive technique has been proposed to properly certify an adhesive bonding structure
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