Effect of Partial Debonding on Response of Perforated Plates Repaired with Square Composite Patches

The performance of perforated metallic plates repaired with laminated composite patches is presented in this study. A square aluminum plate with a central circular cutout is considered as a damaged structural element. Numerical studies using commercial finite element code were conducted to investigate the effects of variation in laminate parameters such as number of plies, fiber orientation, and stacking sequences on free vibration responses of the repaired plates. Particular emphasis is placed on the effect of imperfect bonding (patch debonding). A quantitative measure for the effectiveness of the composite patches parameters is taken to be the relative change in natural frequencies of the deboned patches compare to the patches with perfect bonding. The results presented herein indicated that, vibration response of a repaired perforated metallic plate is affected by the number of plies, stacking sequences of the patch and the quality of bonding between the patch and the base plate.