A yarn-scale woven fabric model including significant slippage formulated within the Arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian framework

Abstract

A numerical model is proposed to simulate significant yarn slippage and unweaving in woven fabrics using the Arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) method. Woven fabrics were modeled at the yarn scale using 1D ALE elements with additional slip displacement degrees of freedom (DOF). The relatively weak bending stiffness of the yarn was included using a rotation-free approach. A weave kinematic constraint between crossing yarns allowed an efficient description of the deformation modes due to the yarn assembly such as in-plane shear. In particular, normal compaction at weave points was taken into account using an additional crimp amplitude DOF and couplings of the fabric’s cohesion with the normal and lateral compaction were considered. To deal with yarn unweaving, a specific void-ALE 1D element was developed in order to avoid remeshing, time-step reduction (explicit scheme) and early deactivation of the weave kinematic constraint. To demonstrate the capabilities of this numerical model, common characterization tests such as in-plane and out-of-plane pullouts, which induced unweaving were simulated. Finally, a first forming simulation on a hemisphere was performed to verify whether the cohesion of the fabric remained well represented in situations without loss of cohesion before simulating forming on a prismatic punch involving significant yarn slippage.