Dynamic behavior of a woven glass-fiber-reinforced polymer composite at high strain rates and its dynamic constitutive relationship

ABSTRACT

The dynamic behavior of a woven glass-fiber-reinforced polymer composite at different strain rates was investigated. Regarded as a transversely isotropic material, dynamic compression tests of the composite in the normal and tangent directions were conducted by Split-Hopkinson pressure-bar devices. The experimental results show: (1) This composite is a viscoelastic material, and the dynamic compression-failure stress of the material indicates a distinct strain-rate hardening effect. The compression-failure stress in the normal direction increases by almost 30% when the strain rate changes from 900/s to 2000/s. The failure stress in the tangent direction is enhanced by 34% when the strain rate increases from 700/s to 2000/s. The failure stresses of the composite depend linearly on the strain rates, and the corresponding strain-rate hardening factors are 0.14 and 0.046 for the normal and tangent directions, respectively. (2) The dynamic compression-failure stresses and failure strains in the normal direction are significantly larger than the corresponding values in the tangent direction at different strain rates. Based on these results, the modified ZWT viscoelastic model was adopted, and the constitutive relationships of the composite in two directions are presented for characterizing their dynamic compression response.

KEYWORDS:

• Polymer matrix composites
• glass fibers
• woven fabric
• dynamic behavior
• viscoelastic constitutive relationship

Funding

The project was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 11202206, 11472008), Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education (Grant No. 20123415120001), China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Grant No. 2011M501057), Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant No. 30915118801), Anhui Provincial Key Science Foundation for Outstanding Young Talent (Grant No. 2012SQRL049ZD), and Doctoral Foundation of Anhui University of Science and Technology (Grant No. 2011YB007).