Prediction of the gradual solid particle erosion of particulate-reinforced epoxy-matrix composites using surface evolution modeling

This study models erosion in particulate-reinforced polymeric composites exposed to abrasive particle impacts. When abrasive particles are much smaller than reinforcements, both phases erode gradually at different rates and traditional numerical modeling is not feasible because of the large number of impacts required to be simulated. Thus, a novel surface evolution methodology which bypasses explicit impact modeling is introduced. By solving two coupled nonlinear three-dimensional partial differential equations for the matrix and reinforcements, the composite erosion rates can be predicted based on the individual phase erosion rates. For a 447 µm alumina particle-reinforced epoxy composite eroded by a 22 µm SiC abrasive, the predicted and measured erosion rates agreed within ~1.5% at oblique incidence and ~10% at perpendicular incidence.