Effect of Support and Adhesive Tape to Reduce Delamination of Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer during Drilling

Abstract

Drilling carbon fibre reinforced polymers (CFRP) often causes several kinds of damage around the hole, such as delamination, which is considered one of the main issues that may occur when drilling the CFRP laminate. It significantly decreases the structural strength of the composite material and reduces its long-term performance. Using support plates and stacked materials as layers on the composite material has been identified as one of the main methods often used to reduce delamination. This research investigates the variations in delamination, fibre pull-out, thrust force, drilling torque, circularity and diameter error when drilling with and without adhesive tape layers. Furthermore, the research paper also explores the effect of varying drilling conditions and drill bit geometries on those output parameters. It has been revealed from the results that the proposed use of both adhesive tape layers and support plates can significantly limit delamination and fibre pull-out damages, thereby achieving a better-quality hole when drilling CFRP, as opposed to just using adhesive tape layers.

Keywords

PCFRP / support / drilling / delamination / carbon fibre reinforced polymer

Author Contributions

A.K.B.: conceptualization and methodology, writing—reviewing and editing; A.P.: supervision, conceptualization and methodology data curation, writing—original draft preparation; S.S.: writing—reviewing and editing; T. M.: writing—reviewing and editing; C.P.: writing—reviewing and editing. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research received no external funding.

Data Availability Statement

Data is available on request.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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