Effect of Imperfect Interfaces on Elastothermodynamic Damping of Particulate Metal-Matrix Composites

Abstract

Most of the works related to the evaluation of elastothermodynamic damping in particle-reinforced metal-matrix composite assume perfect interfaces between reinforcement and matrix. On the contrary, composite materials do have imperfect interfaces because of debonding between the reinforcement and matrix. With passage of time, debonding becomes more extensive. In the present work, imperfect mechanical and thermal interface has been considered for the calculation of energy dissipation in the composite sphere model subjected to the uniform time-harmonic excitation. Two non-dimensional parameters quantifying the mechanical and thermal imperfectness at the interfaces have been identified. It is observed that specific damping capacity increases due to mechanical imperfection whereas it decreases due to thermal imperfection and hence the two types of imperfection have compensatory effects on the specific damping capacity.