Open Access

ARTICLE

Modeling the Response of 3D Textile Composites under Compressive Loads to Predict Compressive Strength

M. Pankow¹, A.M. Waas², C.F. Yen³

1 Composite Structures Laboratory, Department of Aerospace Engineering, University of Michigan, 1320 Beal Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2140, USA
2 Corresponding author. Email: dcw@umich.edu
3 Army Research Laboratory, Aberdeen, MD, USA

Computers, Materials & Continua 2012, 32(2), 81-106. https://doi.org/10.3970/cmc.2012.032.081

Abstract

The compression response of 3D woven textile composites (3DWC) that consist of glass fiber tows and a polymer matrix material is studied using a combination of experiments and finite element based analyses. A previous study reported by the authors consisted of an experimental investigation of 3DWC under high strain rate loading, Pankow, Salvi, Waas, Yen, and Ghiorse (2011). Those experimental results were explained by using the finite element method to analyze the high rate deformation response of representative volume elements (RVEs) of the 3DWC, Pankow, Waas, Yen, and Ghiorse (2012). In this paper, the same modeling strategy is used to examine the quasi-static, compressive deformation response of 3DWC. The effect of using different numbers of the textile repeat unit architecture in the RVE, on the predicted compression strength, is examined. The transitions in failure modes that are seen in experiments are seen to be captured by the model that is presented here.

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