Biography

Mike Gower graduated from Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine with a BEng degree in Aeronautical Engineering. He received an MSc in Composite Materials from Imperial College in 1994, with his dissertation focussing on the development of test methods for measuring the through-thickness tensile strength of laminated composites. Mike joined the Materials Division at NPL in 1995. During his career at NPL he has worked on the development of sandwich construction test methods, the formulation of a standard qualification plan for composite materials, the development of static and fatigue damage tolerance test methods and frameworks for the assessment of defect criticality in composite structures and components. He also has extensive experience of finite element modelling of composite structures.

Mike has been a Measurement Service provider for mechanical testing and physical characterisation of composites, and has been involved in several TSB collaborative projects. He is currently the technical area leader for the Polymer Composites Group.

Current Interests

Mike is currently working on projects looking at developing residual stress measurement techniques for polymer composites based on incremental slitting and embedded fibre Bragg gratings, and the development of operational procedures for non-destructive evaluation (NDE) techniques suitable for composite component inspection.

Selected publications

• Fibre Reinforced Plastic Composites - Qualification of Composite Materials
  M. R. L. Gower and G.D. Sims
  NPL Measurement Good Practice Guide No^. 64 (2003)
• Assessment and Criticality of Defects and Damage in Material Systems
  M. R. L. Gower and G. D. Sims (and R. Lee, S. Frost and M. Wall, AEA technology)
  NPL Measurement Good Practice Guide No 78 (2005)
• Good Practice Guide for the Assessment of Damage Tolerance Under Long-Term Loading
  M. R. L. Gower, R. M. Shaw and G. D. Sims
  NPL Measurement Good Practice Guide No 101 (2007)
• Alternative Energy Technologies – Chapter: Wind Power Generation
  M. R. L. Gower
  Report 4, Materials UK Energy Review (2007)
• Development of Test Methods for Measuring Thick Section Tensile and Compression Properties of Polymer Matrix Composites
  M. R. L. Gower and R. M. Shaw
  NPL Report MN 06 (2009)
• Towards a Planar Cruciform Specimen for Biaxial Characterisation of Polymer Matrix Composites
  M. R. L. Gower and R. M. Shaw
  Applied Mechanics and Materials, 24-25, pages 115-120 (2010)
• Use of a surface-mounted chirped fibre Bragg grating sensor to monitor delamination growth in a double-cantilever beam test
  A. R. Sanderson, S. L. Ogin, A .D. Crocombe, M. R. L. Gower and R. J. Lee
  Composites Science and Technology – submitted 03/05/2011
• Prediction of Surface Cracks in Thick Composite Laminates with Blocked Plies
  M. R. L. Gower, R. M. Shaw, N. McCartney, T. Garstka, S. Lemanski, and P. Lyons
  Composites Part A: Applied Science and Manufacturing – to be submitted

Conferences

• A Standard Qualification Plan for Composite Material Systems
  M. R. L. Gower and G. D. Sims
  COMPTEST 2004
• Validation of FEA Predictions Using Strain Mapping Techniques
  M. R. L. Gower, W. R. Broughton, L. Crocker, R. M. Shaw and G. Klimaytys
  NAFEMS – Simulation Versus Test Seminar (2006)
• Assessment of the Applicability of Compression-After-Impact (CAI) and Open-Hole Tension (OHT) Methods for Use Under Fatigue Loading
  M. R. L. Gower, R. M. Shaw, G. D. Pilkington and W. R. Broughton
  ECCM-13 (2008)
• Development of Test Methods for Measuring Thick Section Tensile and Compression Properties of Polymer Matrix Composites
  M. R. L. Gower and R. M. Shaw
  ECCM-14 (2010)
• Towards a Planar Cruciform Specimen for Biaxial Characterisation of Polymer Matrix Composites
  M. R. L. Gower and R. M. Shaw
  7th BSSM International Conference on Advances in Experimental Mechanics (2010)
• Prediction of Surface Cracks in Thick Composite Laminates with Blocked Plies
  M. R. L. Gower, R. M. Shaw, N. McCartney, T. Garstka, S. Lemanski, and P. Lyons
  Deformation and Fracture of Composites 11 (2011)

Posters

• Effect of Cure Cycle on the Properties of Thick Carbon / Epoxy Laminates
  M. R. L. Gower, R. M. Shaw and W. R. Broughton
  ICCM-17 (2009)

Contact details

E-mail: michael.gower@npl.co.uk
Tel: 020 8943 8625