Effect of defects combined with impact damage on compressive residual strength in curved CFRP specimen

Abstract

This work reports the results of a test campaign conducted on curved carbon–epoxy​ specimens subjected to impact damage combined with manufactured embedded wrinkle defects in order to study the influence of this combination on the compressive strength. A numerical model was used to model wrinkle defects and to carry out a numerical study of their influence on impact and compression after impact (CAI) tests. The model produced acceptable results for low misalignments but for higher levels the model failed. Investigations conducted in this work suggest that damage tolerance studies should consider impact, rather than wrinkle defects, as a priority.