CHARACTERIZATION OF DAMAGE RESISTANCE AND DAMAGE TOLERANCE BEHAVIOUR OF COMPOSITE LAMINATES

The need to characterize damage resistance and damage tolerance behaviour of composite laminates was proposed by the design requirements and usage experience. Based on the experimental study, the authors pointed out that traditional CAI (by NASA standard) could not guide development of materials and structural design correctly. In the paper, it was proposed that the damage resistance behaviour could be characterized by the maximum contact force F_(max) of the contact force-dent depth curve of typical laminates and the damage tolerance behaviour could be characterized by the threshold CAIT(Compression failure strain After Impact Threshold) of the dent depth -compressive failure strain curve of typical laminates. In the meanwhile the suggestion for their measurement methods was proposed as well.