The increasing use in the aerospace industry of strong, lightweight composite materials in primary structural components promises to substantially reduce aircraft non-pay-load weight, improving fuel consumption and operating profitability. This study explores the extension of composite material to regions of gas turbine engines previously considered too hot for composites with moderate melting points. Throughout the majority of a gas turbine cycle, gas stream temperatures exceed the polymer composite glass transition by a considerable margin. Boundary layer cooling strategies, however, may be adopted in the compression stages to extend the downstream distance that can be constructed using lightweight composites. This paper presents formulation and validation of a numerical model and its use in an optimisation study to develop a systematic process for thermal design of polymer composite structures in 'warm' gas streams. Internal vascular and external boundary layer film cooling strategies are considered.
Aerospace structures comprised of composite materials are traditionally certified empirically via the Building Block Approach (BBA). While this approach has been performed successfully in the past, it is expensive and time consuming. One means to improve the overall efficiency of composite structural certification is to reduce the cost of the BAA by eliminating the need for some tests by incorporating damage analysis tools. For an analysis to replace a given test, the tool must first be validated using other similar test data. The subject of this paper is a description of an analysis technique for simulating compression after damage strength of a solid laminate. The analysis technique is one that is practical for use in an applied engineering context due to efforts to minimize necessary computational resources and complexity of the model.
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