ELASTIC PROPERTIES OF COMPOSITES WITH FIBER WAVINESS

An investigation was conducted of the effects of fiber waviness on the elastic properties of composite materials theoretically and experimen tally. Unidirectional and crossply carbon/epoxy composites with unifor m, graded and localized fiber waviness were studied. An analytical con stitutive model was developed to determine the elastic properties as a function of fiber waviness. Compression tests were conducted to verif y the constitutive relations. Experimental results were in good agreem ent with predictions based on the constitutive model. Copyright (C) 19 96 Elsevier Science Ltd