22nd Congress of International Council of the Aeronautical Sciences, Harrogate, UK, 28 August - 1st September, 2000
Paper ICAS 2000-4.1.R2

FAILURE ANALYSIS OF COMPOSITE LAMINATES WITH AN OPEN HOLE UNDER BI-AXIAL COMPRESSION TENSION LOADING

C. Soutis (1), P. T. Curtis (2)
(1) Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London, UK; (2) DERA, UK

Keywords: composite laminates, bi-axial loading, fibre microbuckling, strength prediction

An approximate solution for the normal stress distribution adjacent to a circular hole in an orthotropic laminate is employed with a recently developed fracture mechanics model to predict its failure strength under compressiontensionl loading. Using the independently measured laminate parameters of unnotched strength and in-plane fracture toughness, the model successfully predicts the damage initiation, growth and final fracture of notched multidirectional laminates under various biaxiality ratios.

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