Joining of aluminium foams with fasteners and adhesives

This paper describes methods of joining aluminium foams with mechanical fas teners and with adhesives, and characterises the mechanical properties of t he resulting joints. Different techniques of joining were investigated unde r monotonic and cyclic pull-out and bearing loads. The effects of fastener geometry on pull-out and bearing-load failure are modelled. Cyclic loading reduces the maximum load a fastener can carry without failure to 0.35 of th e static failure load. Epoxy adhesive joints are stronger than the foam its elf in all modes of loading: failure always occurs remote from the joint. ( C) 2000 Kluwer Academic Publishers.