PROGRESSIVE FAILURE AND ULTIMATE COLLAPSE OF LAMINATED COMPOSITE PLATES IN BENDING

A method is presented to study the non-linear behaviour, first ply fai lure and ultimate collapse of laminated composite plates with clamped edges, subjected to transverse pressure. Several failure criteria, inc luding Hashin's and Tsai-Wu's, are used to predict the failure mechani sms. The effect of aspect ratio on the strength and stiffness of lamin ated composite plates is studied. Non-linear strain-displacement relat ions that contain large strain and large rotation are used in the anal ysis. The general purpose finite element program ABAQUS is used for th e analysis. The stiffness reduction is carried out at the Gauss points of the finite element mesh depending on the mode of failure. The pred ictions of the model correlate well with experimental data for differe nt aspect ratios. (C) 1998 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All righ ts reserved.