DYNAMIC COMPRESSIVE FAILURE OF FIBER COMPOSITES

A model is presented for the dynamic compressive response of polymer m atrix fiber composites. The model includes the effects of fiber misali gnment and material nonlinearity as well as material inertia. The role of fiber bending stiffness is included via a couple stress formulatio n. The response of fiber composites to suddenly applied, constant comp ressive axial load is examined. It is found that under constant load, inertial effects contribute to a reduction in the critical stress for composite failure. This reduction is greatest for composites with long initial fiber imperfection wavelengths. For a given load, there is a range of initial fiber imperfection wavelengths that will result in co mposite failure. Within this range, there is a preferred wavelength, w hich results in the shortest failure time. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd