Author(s)

H. Nguyen-Hoa & T. Vu-Khanh

Abstract

Fracture and damage in polyester/glass woven fabric composites H Nguyen-Hoa, T. Vu-Khanh Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sherbrooke University, Canada. Abstract The strength and failure-mode of polyester reinforced by woven glass fabrics are investigated. According to the classical laminate theory, for angle ply laminate made of unidirectional layers failure occurs at both 0/2 and -6/2 layers at the same time under uniaxial tension. This means that there is no knee-point in the stress-strain curve. However, a clear knee-point corresponding to the onset of damage has been observed in woven fabric composites well before ultimate failure. Low cycle fatigue-tests have also been carried out in tensile cyclic loading with constant strain amplitude to analyse the damage evolution. Microscopic examination reveals a direct correlation between delamination, matrix cracking, fibre fracture, and fatigue damage in this class of composite. 1 Introduction Polymers reinforced by

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