Progressive Failure Analysis of Composite/Aluminum Riveted Joints Subjected to Pull-Through Loading

Out-of-plane mechanical properties of the riveted joints restrict the performance of the wing box assembly of airplane.It is necessary to investigate the pull-through performance of the composite/metal riveted joints in order to guide the riveting design and ensure the safety of the wing box assembly.The progressive failure mechanism of composite/aluminum riveted joint subjected to pull-through loading was investigated by experiments and finite element method.A progressive damage model based on the Hashin-type criteria and zero-thickness cohesive zone method was developed by VUMAT subroutine,which was validated by both open-hole tensile test and three-point bending test.Predicted load-displacement response,failure modes and damage propagation were analysed and compared with the results of the pull-through tests.There are 4 obvious characteristic stages on the load-displacement curve of the pull-through test and that of the finite element model:first load take-up stage,damage stage,second load take-up stage and failure stage.Relative error of stiffness,first load peak and second load peak between finite element method and experiments were 8.1%,-3.3%and 10.6%,respectively.It was found that the specimen was mainly broken by rivet-penetration fracture and delamination of plies of the composite laminate.And the material within the scope of the rivet head is more dangerous with more serious tensile damages than other regions,especially for 90°plies.This study proposes a numerical method for damage prediction and reveals the progressive failure mechanism of the hybrid material riveted joints subjected to the pull-through loading.

Thermo-mechanical properties of RTM-made carbon fibre/polyimide composite attaching collar under transient heating

This study focuses on the thermo-mechanical properties of Carbon Fibre/Polyimide Composite(CFPC)attaching collars under transient heating.The CFPC attaching collars were fabricated by a high-temperature resin transfer moulding process,and their thermo-mechanical properties under the conditions of simultaneous transient heating and bending load were investigated.The results show that the attaching collar tends to fail at 118% of the limit load.The failure mode includes the fracture of the connecting screws,local extrusion damage of the hole edges,and slight ablation damage at the outer plies.And there is no observable residual deformation in the composite attaching collar.Furthermore,considering that the material properties vary with temperature,a progressive damage model based on the sequential thermo-mechanical coupling method was established to study the failure mechanism of the attaching collar.Finally,the damage factor of the CFPC was calculated to assess the safety status of the attaching collar.The results show that the primary damage modes of the composite attaching collar are intralaminar failure,which mainly occurs at the heat insulation layer and the hole edges,and these slightly affect the structural bearing capacity.A good correlation between the experiment and FEA is obtained.The test methods and analysis models proposed contribute to the safety assessment of composite structures under transient heating.

Theoretical study of failure in composite pressure vessels subjected to low-velocity impact and internal pressure

A theoretical solution is aimed to be developed in this research for predicting the failure in internally pressurized composite pressure vessels exposed to low-velocity impact.Both in-plane and out-of-plane failure modes are taken into account simultaneously and thus all components of the stress and strain fields are derived.For this purpose,layer-wise theory is employed in a composite cylinder under internal pressure and low-velocity impact.Obtained stress/strain components are fed into appropriate failure criteria for investigating the occurrence of failure.In case of experiencing any in-plane failure mode,the evolution of damage is modeled using progressive damage modeling in the context of continuum damage mechanics.Namely,mechanical properties of failed ply are degraded and stress analysis is performed on the updated status of the model.In the event of delamination occurrence,the solution is terminated.The obtained results are validated with available experimental observations in open literature.It is observed that the sequence of in-plane failure and delamination varies by increasing the impact energy.

Uncertainty evaluation for bearing fatigue property of CFRP double-lap,single-bolt joints

The considerable uncertainty in mechanical properties of composite bolted joints not only prevents advanced composite materials from efficient applications,but also threatens the safety and reliability of the aircraft structures.In this paper,the uncertainty in bearing fatigue properties of a CFRP double-lap,single-bolt joint was evaluated by combing a Progressive Fatigue Damage Model(PFDM)with the interval analysis method.In the PFDM,a residualstrain-based gradual material degradation model and a strain-based fatigue failure criterion were combined with a micromechanics-based sudden material degradation model to predict fatigue properties of the joint.Based on the interval analysis,the key uncertain parameters,which were firstly picked out from eighteen structural parameters of the joint,were described by estimated intervals,and the envelope cases were determined to estimate the lower and upper bounds of fatigue properties of the joint.The predicted results have the same tendency with the experimental results in literatures,which indicates that the PFDM combined with the interval analysis shows potential in efficiently evaluating the fatigue reliability of the complex bolted joints with an adequate accuracy.