Mechanical and vibration characteristics of laminated composite plates embedding shape memory alloy superelastic wires

Currently there is a great interest in the study of shape memory alloy (SMA) composites, since SMA wires with a small diameter have become commercially available. Many potential uses have been found for SMA composites in shape control, vibration control and for the realization of structures with improved damage tolerance. In this work two types of SMA hybridized composites are presented for investigating the mechanical and vibration characteristics. The first one contains unidirectional superelastic SMA wires, while the other has been realized with embedded woven SMA layers. The samples from these laminates have been tested according to “Charpy method” (ASTM D256) and static flexural test method (ASTM D790), to evaluate the influence of the integration of thin superelastic shape memory alloy (SMA) wires on the impact behavior  and the mechanical properties of the hybrid composites. Moreover, since the SMA wires are expected to give damping capacity, by measuring the vibration mode of a clamped cantilever using laser vibrometry the influence of both SMA arrangements on the vibration characteristics has been investigated. At last further tests have been carried out on composite panels realized embedding unidirectional steel wires, to distinguish the influence of the martensitic transformation from the pure introduction of a metallic wire into the polymeric matrix.