Damage behavior of composite thin-walled cylinders fabricated under ultra-high speed rotation winding

Abstract For the fiber composite rotating drums used in specialized equipment in the nuclear industry, they are in a state of long-term high stress during operation. If their damage behavior is studied only from a macro perspective, the practical guiding significance for engineering problems is not significant. In this paper, the cell element method (a meso-scale approach) is embedded into the finite element model, and the meso-scale stress field of the material is calculated using the cell element method. A macro-meso dual-scale damage analysis model is constructed from two aspects: interlayer damage research and intralayer damage research, and the correctness of the model is verified through experiments. By applying this model, the failure mechanisms and damage evolution laws of composite cylindrical shells under two dominant loading conditions (when the ends are subjected to winding-induced prestress loads) are studied, namely compressive instability failure (when compressive loads are dominant) and bending failure (when bending loads are dominant). The results show that: the transverse stress of the matrix in the 31° angled layer leads to compressive instability failure at the end of the cylindrical shell; the bending failure of the 50° angled layer is caused by the axial bending stress concentration at the end of the composite material under winding tension, which induces radial cracks in the circumferential layer and ultimately results in bending failure at the end of the cylindrical shell.