Impact properties of novel corrosion resistant hybrid structures

The objectives of this study were to investigate the effect of impact energy and rubber thickness on the impact properties of layered steel/rubber/composite hybrid structures. Both stainless steel and mild steel based hybrid structures were investigated. The degree of damage, the failure modes, and the absorbed energy were studied.It was found that rubber between steel and composite layers absorbs the impact energy and decreases the interfacial and internal damage in the studied hybrid structure and in its components. The amount of the absorbed energy did not change substantially when comparing structures with and without rubber. However, the area of permanent damage showed a decrease of nearly 50% with the use of rubber when comparing a structure without rubber to a structure with 1.5 mm rubber. In addition, it was observed that the area of the damage is linearly dependent on the impact energy. The main damage mechanisms found were delamination at the steel/rubber and composite/rubber interfaces and fibre/matrix debonding in the composite layer.