Kinetic and thermo-viscoelastic characterisation of the epoxy adhesive in GLARE

Epoxy FM-94 has a temperature dependent and viscoelastic response which is used for metal bonding applications and composite laminates like GLARE. A Dynamic Mechanical Analysis is performed on the epoxy FM-94 adhesive. A master curve is produced using the time-temperature superposition principle and is modelled as a Prony series. In addition, the cure kinetics of the adhesive are measured using DSC (Differential Scanning Calorimetry) and fitted to a standard kinetic model. Both the kinetics and the thermo-viscoelastic models can be used in subsequent research to predict the cure induced and residual thermal stresses due to the composite processing steps.