Investigation on stress distribution of multilayered composite structure (MCS) using infrared thermographic technique

• LITI measurement is in good agreement with FEM analysis for TSA on MCS.
• An artificial neural network was proposed to determine the component of MCS.
• LITI is an attractive tool for stress distribution analysis of MCS.

In this paper, the thermoelastic stress analysis (TSA) on a multilayered composite structure (MCS) was investigated by means of lock-in thermographic image technique (LITI). The application of thermoelastic stress analysis on MCS becomes particularly complicated due to consisting of different material components, which determines the different thermoelastic coupling response depended on material thermal-physical property. The thermoelastic coupling constants (TCC) of GFRP, medium-carbon steel and foam were obtained through thermomechanical calibration experiments, respectively. An artificial neural network was proposed to determine the component of MCS. Comparisons between finite element analysis (FEA) and LITI measurement are reported. It is found that the stress distribution of MCS can be evaluated with good accuracies using LITI measurement.