The application of modeling theories and the choice of failure criteria are difficult in part because they are too varied and must be validated by biaxial tests, which are expensive to be performed. This article is devoted to the nonlinear modeling and failure criteria which are employed in the design and analysis of anisotropic materials. Indeed, in this work, a study of the macroscopic and microscopic behavior of a graphite epoxy under a three-point bending test is conducted, and the successive failures are also predicted. Experimentally, the damage progression and the effect of geometrical parameters are followed and identified in detail. The analytical modeling is based on a recently developed approximation for isotropic materials. This approximation is also valid for the studied quasi-isotropic laminated composite. A software program has been elaborated for the application of the most general failure criteria. The results obtained by this analytical modeling show a good correlation with those of the experimental study.
The vacuum assisted resin infusion (VARI) process is a cost-effective technique for manufacturing lightweight large complex composite components. It belongs to the liquid composite molding (LCM) family. In this process, a fibrous preform is placed into a mold cavity, and covered by a vacuum bag, then a sealant tape is used to adhere it to the mold in order to avoid air-resin leakage. A vacuum pump is used to evacuate the air from the closed cavity which leads to compact the fabric preform. The inlet gate is opened and resin impregnates the preform under atmospheric pressure. Based on the tripping of compaction and resin infusion phases, several manufacturing routes manifest and have influence on the process time, resin pressure distribution and preform thickness uniformity. In this paper, a numerical simulation, based on the finite difference method, is conducted to investigate the effect of four major manufacturing routes of VARI process on the aforementioned parameters. The obtained results reveal that the merging of the air vacuuming and resin infusion phases has no mentioned effect on the reduction of the process time. While, the fourth manufacturing route, where the resin injection precedes vacuuming phase, is the best practice of vacuum assisted resin infusion process. In its optimum scenario, this route can reduce the process time with 19.9% as compared to the optimum scenario of the first manufacturing route.
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