Repair of a delaminated plate under static loading with piezoelectric patches

Repair of a delaminated plate under a static loading with piezoelectric patches is developed through a numerical model and the finite element method (FEM). Tensile and compressive forces distributed on the upper and lower layers of the delamination, which would lead to a shear stress singularity and the corresponding second fracture mode on the delamination edges, are solved by the numerical model. In order to repair the delaminated plate by eliminating the tensile and compressive forces along the edges of delamination layers with piezoelectric patches, a design of discrete electrodes on the patches is developed and the voltages on the electrodes are calculated and verified by the FEM. The dependence of the size and location of the delamination area on the voltages applied to the discrete electrodes is also discussed.