Spew formation in a single lap joint

In adhesive bonded joints the shape of adhesive region plays a crucial role regarding joint strength. Joint performance is determined by both solve for nominal geometric parameters such as film thickness and overlap length, and by local effects introduced by the local shape of the adherents, or by spews emerging at free boundaries, because the overall shape is responsible of actual stress distributions. This work is addressed to the study of joint formation considering the actual adhesive flow produced during joint assembly. A two-dimensional computational fluid dynamics model is considered for this purpose to simulate the actual adhesive motion during this stage while a structural analysis tool is employed to solve for the stress distributions. Such approach allows to take into account all the most-important parameters. Accordingly, the pursued structural performances can be prescribed, by changing the described parameters. (C) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.