The objective of this study is to define a reliable tool for dimensioning of adhesively bonded assemblies, particularly for marine and underwater applications. This paper presents experimental and numerical results, which describe the non-linear behaviour of an adhesive in a bonded assembly for various loadings. A modified Arcan fixture, well-suited for the study of the behaviour of bonded metal-metal assemblies, was developed in order to focus on the analysis of the behaviour of the adhesive in thin films. The edge effects are minimised by using an appropriate design of the substrates so that experimental results give reliable data. To analyze the kinematics of the deformation of the adhesive joint non-contact extensometry techniques were employed. Thus, various characteristics of the non-linear behaviour of the adhesive were observed. The results obtained for mixed assemblies (steel, aluminium, composite substrates) show similar behaviour of the adhesive using the proposed procedure. Furthermore, quality controls by DSC, and studies of curing by DMA have been performed to verify the bonding procedure. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.