DELAMINATION DUE TO INTERACTION BETWEEN CURVATURE INDUCED INTERLAMINAR TENSION AND STRESSES AT TERMINATING PLIES

Curved unidirectional glass fibre-epoxy specimens with some of the pli es on the tension side cut across the complete width have been tested in four point bending. Two sets of tests were carried out with the cut plies in different positions through the thickness to change the rati o between the overall interlaminar tensile stresses induced by the cur vature and the local stresses at the cut. A failure envelope based on a linear interaction between overall and local stresses is shown to be a reasonable fit to the experimental data.