Impact response of composite laminates based on epoxy and glass fibre

Abstract

Initially, the behavior of the glass fibre reinforced epoxy (GF/Epoxy) composites under low velocity impact loading was investigated experimentally. The experimental data were then compared with the corresponding numerical results to validate a number of finite element models. Here, simulations were developed, using ABAQUS/Explicit software, to predict the response of these composite laminates under impact loading. The composite plates were modelled using Hashin failure criteria. The result showed that the developed FE models were correlated well with data obtained experimentally. The influence of parameters, i.e. impact energy, indentor diameter and impact velocity on the behavior of GF/Epoxy plates were then investigated numerically. The results have shown that the values of peak force and absorbed energy increase with the impact energy. Increasing the projectile diameter leads to increase the values of peak force, maximum displacement, duration time and perforation energy. It has also shown that the peak forces show no dependency on the impact velocity and the values of absorbed energy values show a noticed reduction as the impact velocity increases.