Paper number 659

DESIGN CRITERIA FOR CONTINUOUS FIBRE REINFORCED MMC BOLT CONNECTORS

Eric Neussl¹, Dirk Fettweis¹, Peter R. Sahm¹, Jérôme Pora², Dominique Schuster²

1Giesserei Institut, RWTH Aachen
Intzestr. 5, D-52072 Aachen, Germany
2Aerospatial 12, rue Pasteur, Suresnes, France

Summary

The bolt connector geometry is of general interest to mechanical engineers as it represents a wide range of applications. These components are generally used for transfer of static or dynamic loads. An analytical model has been developed to predict the stress distribution in the shoulder area of such a component. Experiments with two geometries and different materials, unreinforced and fibre reinforced aluminium, have been performed for the verification of the model. Even though the tensile strength of fibre reinforced aluminium can be much higher than of unreinforced aluminium, 900 MPa compared to 400 MPa, the fibre reinforcement of such a component is not suitable to increase the UTS due to the brittle stress-strain behaviour of the composite. However, a significant improvement of the fatigue behaviour is possible.

Keywords

aluminium matrix composites, fibre reinforcement, bolt connectors, stress distribution.