Fatigue life prediction of circular notched CFRP laminates

Fatigue life prediction and fatigue behavior of circular notched carbon fib er reinforced plastic laminates are presented. Point and average stress cri teria proposed by Whitney and Nuismer are generalized to fatigue fracture c riteria for notched laminates. Residual strength degradation model and the assumptions on the stress redistribution are introduced during the derivati on of prediction equations. S-N curve, Basquin's relation, and Hwang and Ha n's fatigue life prediction equation (FLPE) 1 are chosen for evaluation of residual strength of unnotched laminates and six prediction equations are d erived. Experiments are performed using carbon fiber reinforced plastic lam inates. Presented prediction equations are reasonably close to experimental data and proposed approach is found to be suitable to predict fatigue life of notched composite laminates. (C) 1999 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd . All rights reserved.