Impact behaviour of elastomer based fibre metal laminates

Research has shown that fibre metal laminates (FMLs) are better than monolithic alloys in terms of corrosion resistance, fatigue load, high blast resistance and impact energy absorption. This study aims to explore the potential of manufacturing a new type of FML by introducing fibre reinforced thermoplastic elastomer (FRTPE) layers to replace conventional fibre reinforced thermoplastic polymer (FRTPP) layers within FMLs. With the well-known high damping capability of the elastomer, an FRTPE laminate is expected to have improved impact resistance and shock load absorption ability when compared with its FRTPP layered counterpart. With aluminium sheet as the metal component, different types of FMLs were manufactured using thermoplastic polymers (TPP) and thermoplastic elastomers (TPE) as matrix to incorporate glass fibre reinforcement for FRTPP and FRTPE laminates. A finite element model was developed using ABAQUS to understand the impact behaviour of the proposed FRTPE FML system. The manufactured TPE and TPP based FMLs have been evaluated for their tensile and impact properties. Tensile testing showed that FRTPP based FMLs have higher strengths and moduli, whereas impact strength significantly improved for FRTPE based FMLs as demonstrated by energy absorption during drop weight tests.