A numerical and experimental study of adhesively bonded aluminium single lap joints with an inner chamfer on the adherends

The influence of the height and angle of the inner chamfer near the unload ends of the adherends and the elastic modulus of several adhesives on the stress distribution in the single lap joint has been investigated using both the elasto-plastic finite element analysis (FEA) and experimental methods. The results from FEA show that the peak stress in the mid-bondline decreases enormously as the adherends are chamfered with an angle of 30° and a chamfer height through full thickness on the inner side of the adherend. When the chamfer angle and the chamfer height are taken to be constant (h=H and θ=30°), the peak stresses in the fillet near the ends of the adherends decrease gradually as the elastic modulus of adhesives increases while all the peak stresses in the middle part of the overlap increase enormously except in the case of the peel stress. It is certain that the load-bearing capacities of the joints are better with a chamfer height of H and a chamfer angle of 30°. The results obtained from the numerical modeling were in compliance with the experimental tests.