Researchers from North Carolina State University, Brigham Young University and Ghent University/Imec recently reported on the progress of integrity monitoring of integrally stiffened composite aerospace structures. There is a growing interest in this field as composite structures offer significant advantages over their metal counterparts such as lower weight and improved cost effectiveness. However, even though complex composite structures can be manufactured in an integrated way resulting in relatively strong components, critical induced damage cannot necessarily be observed on the panel surface inevitably requiring monitoring solutions.

In this paper, multiplexed Ormocer^® coated Draw Tower Gratings are deployed during the Vacuum Assisted Resin Transfer Molding panel manufacturing process. The embedded DTG^®s provided detailed information on the severity of impact loading based on the combination of a high-speed interrogator set-up and the excellent strain transfer properties of the Ormocer^® coated DTG^®s. Full spectrum analysis is further more enabled up to 100 kHz revealing more advanced effects resulting from spectral deformation for example.

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