Time and temperature dependent fatigue strengths for three directions of unidirectional CFRP

This paper is concerned with the characterization of time and temperature dependent fatigue strengths for three loading directions of unidirectional CFRP, that is, the longitudinal tensile and compressive directions as parallel to the fiber direction and the transverse tensile direction as transverse to the fiber direction, within the plane of the unidirectional ply, which are the most basic directions for fiber composites. These three kinds of fatigue strengths were measured at various frequencies and temperatures. The master curves of these fatigue strengths were constructed using measured data based on the time-temperature superposition principle. As results, it was cleared that each of three kinds of fatigue strength shows characteristic time and temperature dependent behavior. The tensile fatigue strength for the longitudinal direction of unidirectional CFRP moderately depends on time and temperature as well as the number of cycles to failure. The compressive fatigue strength for the longitudinal direction strongly depends on time and temperature, however this strength scarcely depends on the number of cycles to failure. The tensile fatigue strength for the transverse direction strongly depends on time and temperature as well as the number of cycles to failure.