Morphing of Bistable Composite Laminates Using Distributed Piezoelectric Actuators

Abstract

The use of bistable unsymmetric cross-ply laminates for morphing application has received growing attention in the last few years. So far, most studies use large rectangular piezoelectric Macro Fiber Composite (MFC) patches bonded at the center of the laminate to induce snap-through. However, the use of large rectangular MFC patches bonded in the center of the laminates significantly influences the shape of the laminate by greatly reducing the curvature at the midsection of the laminate where the MFC patches are bonded. This paper presents a study where narrow cocured MFC strips distributed over the entire surface are used to induce snap-through of unsymmetric cross-ply laminates. This MFC configuration allows having a more uniform curvature in the laminate. Since the strips are bonded on both sides, reverse snap-through should be obtained. The study was both theoretical and experimental. A finite element nonlinear analysis was used to predict the two stable cylindrical configurations and the snap-through induced by MFC actuation. For the experimental study, a laminate-MFC structure was manufactured and tested. The shapes were measured using a 3D image correlation system as a function of applied voltage. Good correlations for the cylindrical shape and displacement field were observed.

Design and Experimental Studies of Flexible Trailing Edge for Variable Camber Morphing Wing

“…In the previous studies, the MFC actuator used to induce snap-through is usually a single actuator located in the middle of the laminate. A study by Dano, et al [27] explored using more than one actuator distributed along the laminate.…”

Tooling design and microwave curing technologies for the manufacturing of fiber-reinforced polymer composites in aerospace applications

“…The anisotropic fiber reinforced composite parts, for instance the non-symmetric composite materials, have military and commercial applications for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to stow their wings and control surfaces into very small volumes to permit gun launch or packaging into aircraft mounted aerial drop assemblies [43][44][45]. A study funded by Sandia National Laboratories (Albuquerque, N.M., U.S.A.) has produced an "adaptive" composite wind blade, which promises to reduce the cost of energy from a 1.5 MW turbine by about 2%.…”

An improved model for unsymmetric plates

“…The previous works are not sufficiently accurate to capture the complicated nonlinear dynamics behaviour for unsymmetric bistable plates [20,21,22,23]. Establishing accurate and efficient models for analyzing the nonlinear dynamics of unsymmetric bistable plates is of critical important in the practical design of morphing structures [24,25] and broadband vibration energy harvesting devices [26,27]. More recently, an efficient analytical model for the nonlinear dynamics of bi-stable composite plates [19] was proposed and presented by the authors, which is partially based on the model introduced in this paper.…”