Abstract:The piezoelectric actuator has gained popularity over the last few years. Attention has been directed towards the study of their electromechanical response in active repair and the control of damaged structures. This has been made possible through the development of various numerical and analytical techniques for such studies. The shift of focus towards the piezoelectric based approaches has been due to their advantages, which include strategic cost benefits in maintenance, as well as an increase in the life cycle of the repaired structures. Furthermore, adhesively bonded joints are widely used in the manufacturing and repairing of structures in many industries, especially automotive and aerospace engineering. This is due to the requirement for lightweight materials as well as the potential adhesive used to join materials with different characteristics. The piezoelectric actuator has also shown the capacity in controlling and lowering the shear stress concentration and joint edge peel in adhesively bonded joint systems. The structure's control of stress and repair can generally be viewed as a reinforcement that influences the structure's damage tolerance. Therefore, the interest of this review is on the applications of the piezoelectric actuators in both structural damage and the bonded adhesive joint system. The specific goal is to recognize the contemporary scientific challenges, including future opportunities.

Active repairs using piezoelectric actuators can play a significant role in reducing the crack damage propagation in thin plate structures. Mode-I crack opening displacement is the most predominant one in tension, and it is responsible for the failure which in turn affects the load carrying capability of the cracked structure. In addition, there are limited studies that investigated the effect of the piezoelectric actuator over mode-I active repair. In this study, the mode-I stress intensity factor for a plate with a center crack, and a bonded piezoelectric actuator was modeled using the linear elastic fracture mechanics. For this, an analytical closed-form solution is developed using the virtual crack closure technique taking into account mode-I as the only effective mode, coupling effects of the piezoelectric patch, and the singular stress at the crack tip. In addition, the total stress intensity factor was obtained by the superposition of the stress intensity factor obtained from the stresses produced by the piezoelectric actuators on the crack surfaces as the only external loads on the cracked plate and the stress intensity factor due to the far-field tension load. The proposed analytical model for mode-I stress intensity factor was verified by a finite element–based approach using ANSYS finite element software. The results demonstrated a good agreement between the analytical and finite element models with a relative error of less than 4% in all the cases studied. The results illustrated that the piezoelectric patch is efficient in reducing stress intensity factor when an extension mode of the actuator is applied. However, applying a contraction mode of the piezoelectric actuators produced negative strain which increased the stress intensity factor and thus the severity of the cracked structure and could lead to damage propagation.

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Crack propagation until fracture is an important criterion to predict a structure‘s service life. In order to increase the latter, the cracked component needs to be repaired or replaced. In the present study, a finite element analysis has been carried out to investigate the effects of adhesive thickness, patch thickness and crack length on the passive repair performance of a center-cracked rectangular aluminum plate under mode-I loading condition using an ANSYS package. A comprehensive parametric study shows that the stress intensity factor is influenced by the patch thickness, patch size, adhesive material, and adhesive thickness. ABSTRAK: Penyebaran retak sehingga patah adalah kriteria penting bagi menjangka hayat struktur. Bagi memanjangkan jangka hayat struktur, komponen keretakan perlu dibaik pulih atau diganti. Kajian ini telah menjalankan analisis elemen tak terhingga bagi mengetahui kesan ketebalan pelekat, ketebalan tampalan dan panjang retak pada bahagian keretakan tengah plat petak aluminium yang dibaiki secara pasif, menggunakan pakej ANSYS di bawah beban mod-I. Kajian parametrik yang menyeluruh  menunjukkan faktor tekanan intensif dipengaruhi oleh ketebalan tampalan, saiz tampalan, bahan pelekat dan ketebalan pelekat.

Research activities on active repairs and stress control of structures using piezoelectric actuators and adhesive bond have received much attention in recent years. The function of the adhesive bond on active repair is to transmit the induced stresses by the piezoelectric actuator to the host structure in order to reduce the stress intensity on the crack front. Assessment of repair performance of adhesive bonds is done based on the transfer of the shear and peel stress concentration in the adhesive layer. In the present work, three dimensional finite element analyses have been carried to understand the effects of adhesive properties on active repair performance of a cracked aluminium plate under mode I. Adhesive efficiency is evaluated by the stress intensity factor (SIF) as a fracture criterion. The results show that SIF varies inversely with the adhesive layer’s shear modulus.