Ballistic impact tests and stacked shell simulation analysis of aramid fabric containment system

Abstract

The plain-woven aramid fabrics have been commonly used to offer the high protection against ballistic threats. This paper deals with the tests and numerical investigations on the ballistic impact responses of aramid fabric containment system. A series of quasi-static tensile tests and dynamic tensile tests are conducted to determine the mechanical performance parameters of plain-woven aramid fabric. A series of ballistic impact tests are further carried out with different projectile velocities to investigate the ballistic behavior of aramid fabric containment system, which are fabricated by wrapping multiple layers around a back-up steel ring. The method of using the explicit dynamic software LS-DYNA to establish the stacked shell finite element model for quantitative analysis of the ballistic impact process is developed and conducted, and the failure mode and containment mechanism are discussed in detail through the test and simulation analysis. The results show that both the peak stress and elastic modulus increase significantly with the increasing of strain rate, but the failure strain increases slightly. The ballistic impact energy is consumed mainly through the large deformation of fabric, inter-yarn friction, and interlaminar friction. The simulation results are in good agreement with the test results, and the deformation and failure mode of aramid fabric containment system are better reproduced, which provides the promising finite element method for analyzing the ballistic impact events. In addition, some comparisons in interlaminar contact, impact position and incident attitude of projectile are further conducted and discussed.