Abstract
The impact resistance of fiber-reinforced polymer composites is a critical concern for structure design in aerospace applications. In this work, experiments were conducted to evaluate the impact performance of four types of composite panels, using a gas-gun test system. Computational efficient finite element models were developed to model the high-speed ballistic impact behavior of laminate and textile composites. The models were first validated by comparing the critical impact threshold and the failure patterns against experimental results. The damage progression and energy evolution behavior were combined to analyze the impact failure process of the composite panels. Numerical parametric studies were designed to investigate the sensitivity of impact resistance against impact attitude, including impact deflection angles and projectile deflection angles, which provide a comprehensive understanding of the damage tolerance of the composite panels. The numerical results elaborate the different impact resistances for laminate and textile composites and their different sensitivities to deflection angles.
Highlights
Carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) composites have demonstrated their excellence in reducing the weight of aircraft and enhancing economic efficiency, and is increasingly used in aero engines
Finite element models were developed for each type of composite specimen to investigate their different failure behavior under ballistic impact loads
The balanced in-plane stiffness properties of the textile composite panels result in a larger deformation area and a relatively smaller damage zone, which to a certain extent can for the textile composite panels spread more widely than that of the laminates, with a larger maximum out-of-plane displacement
Summary
Carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) composites have demonstrated their excellence in reducing the weight of aircraft and enhancing economic efficiency, and is increasingly used in aero engines. To visualize the progressive failure process of plain-woven composite, the ply-level FE model is generally used which considering the fabric-reinforced ply as an orthotropic homogeneous material, with potential capability to sustain plastic deformation and stiffness degradation [15] In this way, a simple damage mechanics-based maximum energy dissipation approach was presented by Iannucci et al [16] and implemented into an explicit dynamic FE code, DYNA3D, to predict the impact failure behavior of thin woven composites. In this work, numerical comparison studies were conducted to investigate the variation of impact properties and failure behavior for three types of composite panels (laminated, woven, and triaxially braided composites). The paper is organized as follows: Section 2 introduces materials and experiments; Section 3 introduces the finite element model; Section 4 presents model validation and detailed numerical comparison studies for the impact failure behavior of the three different composite panels; and Section 5 summarizes the main findings and conclusions
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