Experimental and numerical studies on the behaviour of fibre-reinforced composites subjected to soft impact loading

This paper presents detailed experimental and numerical studies on the behaviour of composite laminates subject to impact loading by soft objectives. In this research, gas-gun experiments employ woven carbon fibre reinforced poly (ether-ether ketone) (CF/PEEK) and gelatine projectiles to study the response of composite laminates under soft impact loading. A high-speed camera is employed to capture the deformation of the projectiles and a three-dimensional (3D) Digital Image Correlation (DIC) system is used to record the deformation of the impacted composite specimens. A numerical finite-element (FE) model, in which Hashin’s theory is employed for composite modelling and Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method is used for modelling the gelatine projectile and is developed to simulate the soft impact on the composite laminates. The capability of the developed model is validated using the gas-gun experimental results. Good agreement has been shown between the predictions from using the FE model and the experimental results.