Strength analysis of GFRP composite product taking into account its heterogenic structure for different reinforcements
Wiesław Frącz, Grzegorz Janowski, Grażyna Ryzińska
Quarterly No. 2, 2017 pages 103-108
DOI:
keywords: GFRP composites, numerical homogenization, Digimat software
abstract In this study prediction of the strength properties of composites made of polyester resin and continuous glass fiber reinforcement in established grades was performed. Structure modeling based on the numerical homogenization method was conducted using Digimat FE commercial code, taking into account the geometry and properties of all the composite components. In the first stage, analysis was performed for OCF M8610 mat. At the beginning the calculations were done for beam roving from S glass. Preliminary calculations were performed for the virtual composition of glass fibers-air, which allowed calculation of the yarn properties, directly used to build the glass mat model. The second stage of the calculation was carried out for glass mat saturated with polyester resin. For this purpose, roving bundle data and polymer matrix data were implemented. The volume fraction of the glass mat in the composite was also determined, and a random fiber orientation in the plane was defined. The properties of the fabric-resin composite were calculated for polyester resin and Cofab A1118B glass fiber plain weave fabric. The basic properties of the fiber in the analyzed bi-directional fabric were established on the basis of literature. The calculation of some fabric properties was conducted by a different algorithm than in the case of the mat. The last stage of property calculation for the warp and weft was to predict the weave properties based on the manufacturer's data. Only at this stage was the mean field method (MFM) used in the calculations. The geometrical dimensions of the reinforcements were calculated including its grammage, where the value is highly compatible with the grammage given in the literature. For both types of reinforcement visualization of the composite structure was performed. The calculated composite properties were used in strength simulations of a useful product for three variants of composite reinforcement: (a) polyester resin without reinforcement, (b) polyester resin with glass fiber mat, (c) polyester resin with glass fiber fabric, which allowed carrying out a comparative strength analysis.