Measuring Impact Damage to Toughened CFRP Laminates with Time Domain Reflectometry

Laminated Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) composites are very effective in weight saving in aeronautical structural components. For these laminated CFRP structures, it is difficult to detect damage such as delamination, matrix cracks, and local fiber breakages caused by low-velocity impact loading because these damages are difficult to detect from the outside of the structure. This difficulty of inspection of the laminated CFRP structures demands the development of automatic monitoring or damage detection systems.