Memorizing and detecting an arrested crack in a foam-core sandwich structure using embedded plastic materials and fiber-optic sensors

The authors recently established the 'smart crack arrester' concept to improve the damage tolerance of composite foam-core sandwich structures. The smart crack arrester can simultaneously arrest and detect a crack propagating along the interface between the facesheet and the core. Two fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors are embedded at both edges of the arrester to monitor the internal strain change induced by crack propagation. However, since the developed detection technique utilized transient elastic strain change during high-speed crack propagation, the system required a high-cost measurement system and could fail to detect a fatal interface crack in a practical noisy environment. Thus, this study advances the previous approach. Metal wires are additionally embedded alongside the FBG sensors, resulting in a more easily applicable and reliable crack-detection system with a new technical concept. Specifically, the characteristic strain state induced by arresting the interface crack is first 'memorized' by plastic deformation of the metal wire, and the consequent residual strain is then 'statically' picked up by the FBG sensor as a damage signal. This study begins by simulating deformation of the metal wires and the sensors to evaluate the feasibility of the proposed technique. The significant advantage of adding the metal wires is then demonstrated by comparing data from the new and previous approaches. Finally, a verification test is conducted to confirm that an FBG spectral shape statically obtained after unloading can indicate the propagation direction and tip location of an arrested crack.