BOUNDARY-LAYERS IN WEDGES OF LAMINATED COMPOSITE STRIPS UNDER GENERALIZED PLANE DEFORMATION .1. ASYMPTOTIC SOLUTIONS

Based upon Lekhnitskii's formulation and the Stroh formalism, the stru cture of the asymptotic solutions has been examined for the boundary l ayer on the wedge type cross section of a laminated composite strip. T he composite strip is assumed under the so-called generalized plane de formation, which includes tension, bending and/or torsion by the termi nal tractions as well as the generalized plane strain problem. The sol ution structures are obtained, with the aid of numerical calculation, for various kinds of wedge geometry including the free edge and the de lamination cracks with the crack faces opened or closed. Finally the n ature of the asymptotic solutions is discussed, including the mode mix ity of singular stress field ahead of the wedge tip, it is found that for a free edge problem the mode mixity of the singular asymptotic tra ction vector on the interfacial plane near the free edge remains invar iant under varying types of remote loadings once a pair of adjacent ma terials (or ply orientations) is given and that accordingly one single scaling parameter governs the near field response.