Adhesively-bonded joints provide many advantages over conventional mechanical fasteners and are increasingly receiving attention as an alternative to mechanical joints in engineering applications. The traditional fasteners usually result in the cutting of fibers and hence the introduction of stress concentrations, both of which reduce structural integrity. By contrast, bonded joints are more continuous and have potential advantages of strength-to-weight ratio, design flexibility, and ease of fabrication. This book provides an overview of available analytical methods as well as numerical methods.

This book reports on cutting-edge research and developments in manufacturing, giving a special emphasis to solutions fostering automation and sustainability. Topics cover manufacturing process optimization, remanufacturing, machines and mechanical design, CAD/CAM/CAE, materials characterization and processing, measurement and predictive maintenance techniques. Further topics include artificial intelligence and IoT in manufacturing, robotics, and cutting-edge issues in Industry 4.0/5.0. Based on proceedings of the 32nd edition of the International Conference on Flexible Automation and Intelligent Manufacturing, FAIM 2023, held on June 18 – 22, 2023, in Porto, Portugal, this first volume of a 2-volume set provides academics and professionals with extensive, technical information on trends and technologies in manufacturing, yet it also discusses challenges and practice-oriented experience in all the above-mentioned areas.

This book deals with the most recent numerical modeling of adhesive joints. Advances in damage mechanics and extended finite element method are described in the context of the Finite Element method with examples of application. The book also introduces the classical continuum mechanics and fracture mechanics approach and discusses the boundary element method and the finite difference method with indication of the cases they are most adapted to. At the moment there a no numerical technique that can solve any problem and the analyst needs to be aware of the limitations involved in each case.