Development of experimental and modelling tools for the characterisation of the thermo-electro-mechanical behaviour of composite materials for aircraft applications

The present paper is concerned with the thermoelectric behaviour of CFRP composite samples subjected to DC currents in view of developing experimental and modelling tools for the characterisation of the thermo-electro-mechanical behaviour of composite materials for aircraft applications. DC currents up to 8 A are injected through the specimens end sides by employing several different electrode techniques whose performances are assessed and compared. Sample and electrode contact resistances are measured for different values of the injected current. The transient and permanent temperatures fields promoted by the injected currents are experimentally measured by infrared thermography. The temperature fields are simulated numerically by a thermoelectric coupled model employing the ABAQUS ® FE commercial code; temperatures can be also approximately calculated by a simple lumped parameter model discarding thermal conduction. The comparison between simulations by the models and measurements allows employing the simplified model as a tool to design thermo-electro-mechanical tests.