The compressive failure of notched composites: the effects of geometry and microbuckling softening law

Abstract

The compressive failure of notched composites is modelled from the basis of the understanding that has been reached with regard to the behaviour of cracked elastic softening solids that are subjected to tensile loadings. Particular attention is given to the effects of geometrical parameters and the softening law describing the behaviour of the microbuckling damage zone, and it is shown how the peak load can be related to a solid's geometrical parameters and the damage zone softening law via an analytical expression. The predictions are shown to be consistent with Sutcliffe and Fleck's numerical and experimental results for the compressive failure of centre notched panels of carbon fibre-epoxy laminates.