Tag Archives: Composite Testing

A laminate is a type of composite material, manufactured by assembling several layers of different materials, consolidating by the application of pressure, heat and adhesives in to semi-finished products like sheets or finished shapes. A simple example is a metal polymer laminate, which has a sheet metal adhesively bonded to a polymer films or sheets. There may be many layers of plastic sheet and metal sheets, which are called multilayer laminates. In some cases, polymer sheets may be replaced by foam sheets or woven fabric made of high strength glass or carbon or polymer fibers. Mechanical, physical and chemical properties of laminates are important for application development.

Types of Laminates Testing

Laminates are tested just like a metal or polymers sheets in tension, compression, shear, torsion, etc. But there are some testing unique to laminates. These are peel test, swell test, lap shear test, water resistance test, etc.

Capability – At Touchstone testing laboratory, we have capability to test sheet, bar, rod or tube laminates for mechanical properties like tension, compression, shear, flexure, fracture, fatigue, creep, etc., and physical properties like density, thermal conductivity, dielectric strength, etc. We also have capability to test hardness, abrasion and wear resistance, damage tolerance, water resistance, swell properties, interlaminar properties like shear, peel, etc., of laminate materials.

Some useful standards:

• ASTM D349 – Standard Test Methods for Laminated Round Rods
• ASTM D1781 – Standard Test Method for Climbing Drum Peel for Adhesives
• ASTM D2344 – Standard Test Method for Short-Beam Strength of Polymer MatrixComposite Materials and Their Laminates
• ASTM D4762 – Standard Guide for Testing Polymer Matrix Composite Materials
• ASTM D5766 – Standard Test Method for Open-Hole Tensile Strength of Polymer MatrixComposite Laminates
• ASTM D5961 – Standard Test Method for Bearing Response of Polymer Matrix CompositeLaminates
• ASTM D6484 – Standard Test Method for Open-Hole Compressive Strength of PolymerMatrix Composite Laminates