Cracking Behavior of Environmental Barrier Coatings/Ceramic Matrix Composite System Using Acoustic Emission and Digital Image Correlation

Abstract

An investigation into the cracking behavior of advanced environmental barrier coating/woven SiC/SiC ceramic matrix composite (CMC) system under uni-axial tension testing was performed in this study. The effect of substrate (CMC) condition on the coating behavior was also studied. Acoustic emission (AE) and digital image correlation (DIC) were implemented as health monitoring techniques to gain detailed insights into the fracture process of the coating and to identify the origin and location of the fracture events. Fluorescent penetrant inspection was used in situ in some cases to help identify cracks. Post-test microscopy was performed to correlate the results with DIC and AE. It was evident that for the as-produced woven substrate, the EBC coating cracked prior to substrate cracking; however, for the altered surface substrate, the CMC substrate formed matrix cracks prior to the EBC coating.