A New Unit Cell Concerned Realistic Geometry Structure of 3D Four Directional Braided Composite

Abstract

This paper represented a new unit cell of 3D four directional braided composite for mechanical properties calculation. There are three disadvantages of unit cells in most previous works such as the fiber volume fraction hard to touch the reality despite the packing factor is maximum 1, the yarns are curved subjectively which is far away from realistic geometry structure, a quantity of connected surfaces are neglected as the yarns are not match the real appearance. A new unit cell established based on the real manufacturing process and structure could improve these aspects in this work. The yarn in the unit cell was similar to the real one which was constructed by photos. The details at the conjoined position were also expressed thoroughly. The result of finite element simulation was in good agreement with the available experimental data.