LAUSR

ABSTRACT In this work, constant amplitude fully reversible tension-compression (t-c) fatigue behaviour of two-phased epoxy/glass fibre and three-phased MWCNT/epoxy/glass fibre laminates modified with 0.5 and 1.0 vol.-% of MWCNTs is presented. Addition of 0.5 and 1.0 volume fraction of nanoparticles in the matrix phase increased the fatigue strength of the laminates by approximately 10% and 4%, respectively. GFRP laminates subjected to quasi-static compression and t-c fatigue were found to fail by matrix crushing and shearing contrary to matrix crushing, ply splitting and kink band failure presented by CNT modified laminates. Such mechanisms were due to additional matrix toughening imparted by the nanotubes. Two-parameters Weibull distribution was implemented for the statistical evaluation of the fatigue life data. For safety limits of the test results, S-N curves with reliability levels of 0.99, 0.5, 0.368 and 0.10 were produced using Weibull shape and scale parameters.