The reinforcing mechanism of carbon fiber in composite adhesive for bonding carbon/carbon composites

A carbon fiber reinforced adhesive was developed for bonding carbon/carbon composites. The Weibull distribution method was used to analyze the bonding strength data, and the results showed that when the volume fraction of carbon fiber was 6 vol.%, the Weibull modulus was 42.9393 and the bonding strength of the adhesive was 11.3763 MPa. A model was proposed to explain the reinforcement of carbon fiber, and it was found that the strength of adhesive was a cubic function of the volume fraction of carbon fiber, and the function model was consistent with the Weibull data. We investigated that the carbon fiber could bridge adhesive matrix as a bridging effect for releasing the residual stress and inhibiting the extension of micro-crack.