This presentation was made at NAFEMS UK Conference 2018, Taking Engineering Analysis and Simulation to the Next Level".

The NAFEMS UK Conference 2018 brought together all those involved in analysis and simulation from every corner of industry and academia, giving them an opportunity to advance their knowledge, give their organisations a competitive advantage, and a chance to be part of improving the technology itself.

Resource Abstract

Load carrying cylindrical components are frequently utilised in aerospace design e.g. thrust struts, torque shafts and landing gear components. In order to maximise structural performance and predict ultimate failure loads during the design phase accurate material models must be developed within the context of finite element analysis incorporating deformations, damage accumulation and ultimate failure. This study aims at the development of a robust progressive damage model appropriate to simulate the mechanical behaviour of carbon fibre reinforced epoxy filament wound tubes. To this end, a series of experiments was carried out to study the structural integrity of carbon fibre epoxy filament wounds tubes. In specific, filament wound tubes of various stacking sequences were manufactured and tested under different loading conditions including tension, compression and torsion. A progressive damage model was developed using the commercial finite element analysis code Abaqus/Standard. The material model was developed using Abaqus user subroutine UMAT and it was based on Hashin’s failure criteria, whilst the Element Weakening Method (EWM) was implemented to incorporate damage accumulation and ultimate failure. The model was three- dimensional and static using 3D solid deformable parts. The focus of this study was to capture failure behaviour at a ply level. Therefore, a ply by ply modelling approach was adopted; each layer of the composite tube was assumed to be unidirectional (UD), neglecting any undulation effects caused by the winding process as well as the influence of different winding patterns. Experimental data were compared to the corresponding simulation results and the linear elastic properties as well as damage properties including ultimate strength and damage coefficients were varied until satisfactory correlation between the experimental data and the simulation results was achieved. It was indicated that the developed progressive damage model is capable of predicting the mechanical behaviour of carbon fibre reinforced epoxy filament wound tubes accurately.