Numerical-Experimental Analysis of the Effect of a Stress Concentrator on the Strength of CFRP Material
Abstract
With the increasing use of carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRP) in engineering structures such as pressure vessels, wind turbine blades, and aircraft fuselages, interest in modeling their mechanical response under various loading conditions has been steadily growing. Polymers, including CFRP, enable the aerospace industry to optimize structural design in terms of weight, stiffness, and strength. In the aerospace industry, the assembly of aircraft requires drilling in fiber-reinforced materials to connect consecutive components. This process is particularly challenging due to the initial damage induced during drilling, as well as the fact that the hole itself becomes a site of stress concentration. The presented results concern the numerical analysis of filament-wound structures made of continuous carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP). Due to the wide application of such structures in aerospace and other engineering fields, it is essential to develop a model capable of reliably describing their mechanical behavior in the presence of stress concentrators. The proposed solution is a numerical model with progressive damage, with particular emphasis on incorporating the delamination mechanism.
