Investigation of the Mechanical Properties of Composite Honeycomb Sandwich Panels after Fatigue in Hygrothermal Environments

Abstract

Since carbon fibre composite sandwich structures have high specific strength and specific modulus, which can meet the requirements for the development of aircraft technology, more and more extensive attention has been paid to their residual mechanical properties after subjecting them to fatigue loading in hygrothermal environments. In this paper, the compression and shear characteristics of carbon fibre-reinforced epoxy composite honeycomb sandwich wall panels after fatigue in hygrothermal environments are investigated through experiments. The experimental results show that under compressive loading, the load required for the buckling of composite honeycomb sandwich wall panels after fatigue loading in hygrothermal environments decreases by 25.9% and the damage load decreases by 10.5% compared to those at room temperature. Under shear loading, the load required for buckling to occur is reduced by 26.2% and the breaking load by 12.2% compared to those at room temperature.