Intralaminar toughness characterisation of unbalanced hybrid plain weave laminates

Mauricio V Donadon, Brian G Falzon, Lorenzo Iannucci, John M Hodgkinson

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

49 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

A numerical and experimental investigation on the mode-I intralaminar toughness of a hybrid plain weave composite laminate manufactured using resin infusion under flexible tooling (RIFT) process is presented in this paper. The pre-cracked geometries consisted of overheight compact tension (OCT), double edge notch (DEN) and centrally cracked four-point-bending (4PBT) test specimens. The position as well as the strain field ahead of the crack tip during the loading stage was determined using a digital speckle photogrammetry system. The limitation on the applicability of the standard data reduction schemes for the determination of intralaminar toughness of composite materials is presented and discussed. A methodology based on the numerical evaluation of the strain energy release rate using the J-integral method is proposed to derive new geometric correction functions for the determination of the stress intensity factor for composites. The method accounts for material anisotropy and finite specimen dimension effects regardless of the geometry. The approach has been validated for alternative non-standard specimen geometries. A comparison between different methods currently available for computing the intralaminar fracture toughness in composite laminates is presented and a good agreement between numerical and experimental results using the proposed methodology was obtained.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1597-1611
Number of pages15
JournalComposites Part A: Applied Science and Manufacturing
Volume38
Issue number6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2007
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • A. Fabrics/textiles B. Fracture toughness C. Finite element modelling D. Resin infusion under flexible tooling (RIFT) Data reduction Dynamic loads Finite element method Fracture toughness Photogrammetry Digital speckle photogrammetry systems Intralaminar toughness Overheight compact tension (OCT) Resin infusion under flexible tooling (RIFT) Laminates

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