Size Effects in the Impact of Carbon Fiber Reinforced Composite Structures

Abstract

In this study, target size effects in the low energy impact response of plain CFRP plateswere investigated. It was found that increase the target size leads to a reduction in the maximumimpact force recorded during the test. This is due to the reduction on flexural rigidity of the largerpanels. The experimental results indicated that at energies above the first failure threshold, themaximum impact force does not coincidence with the predicting value. Two mathematical modelswere used to predict the maximum impact force including single degree of freedom (SDOF)spring-mass model and Energy-Balance (E-B) model. The predicting results were then comparedwith the experimental results, and both of the two models show good agreement with theexperimental results in elastic deformation region. In addition, the level of agreement between thepredictions and the experimental results indicate that both models are capable of modelling theimpact response of these CFRP panels at elastic regime.