Engineering Science and Materials Commons^™

Impact Resistance Of Fiber-Reinforced Composites Using Computational Simulations, Maitham Alabbad

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Composite materials are widely used in aerospace, automotive and wind power industries due to their high strength-to-weight and stiffness-to-weight ratios and their improved mechanical properties compared to metals. The damage resistance of composite materials due to low velocity impact depends on fiber breakage, matrix cracking and delamination between the interfaces. In this research, a numerical investigation of low velocity impact response of a multidirectional symmetric carbon-epoxy composite laminate is carried out and presented. Two different finite element models are developed for composite laminates made of non-crimp fabric to investigate their behavior under different levels of impact energy. In the first …