A directed continuum damage mechanics method for modelling composite matrix cracks

Matrix cracking in continuous fibre reinforced composites follows the fibre orientations, but continuum damage mechanics models are not able to properly capture this. A novel method is presented here to alleviate mesh sensitivity of the damage growth direction and represent discrete matrix cracks. I...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Composites science and technology Vol. 176; pp. 1 - 8
Main Authors: Mukhopadhyay, Supratik, Hallett, Stephen R.
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Barking Elsevier Ltd 26.05.2019
Elsevier BV
Subjects:
A. Structural composites
Algorithms
B. Matrix cracking
C. Damage mechanics
C. Finite element analysis (FEA)
Composite materials
Continuous fiber composites
Continuum damage mechanics
Crack propagation
Cracking (fracturing)
Damage assessment
Fiber composites
Fiber orientation
Finite element analysis
Finite element method
Fracture mechanics
Laminates
Materials fatigue
Matrix cracks
Strain localization
Stress intensity factors
Tracking algorithms
A. Structural composites
Tracking algorithms
C. Finite element analysis (FEA)
C. Damage mechanics
B. Matrix cracking
ISSN:0266-3538, 1879-1050
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Matrix cracking in continuous fibre reinforced composites follows the fibre orientations, but continuum damage mechanics models are not able to properly capture this. A novel method is presented here to alleviate mesh sensitivity of the damage growth direction and represent discrete matrix cracks. In a ply-by-ply mesoscale model, matrix cracks within a ply usually rely on mesh dependent strain localisation to decide the crack growth direction. The newly proposed algorithm instead uses the ply level fibre orientation as a model input, and maintains crack advancement along this direction, based on a neighbour searching scheme. A further advantage is that it is able to represent individual cracks discretely, with a predefined minimum crack spacing. This overcomes another limitation of continuum damage models, where discrete cracks are only represented in a smeared sense. This procedure has been shown to be able to reproduce complex crack networks in multidirectional laminates, independent of the mesh pattern.
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ISSN:0266-3538
1879-1050
DOI:10.1016/j.compscitech.2019.03.022