Fiber Inclination Model For Finite Element Analysis Of Three-dimensional Angle Interlock Woven Composite Under Ballistic Penetration

Owing to the existence of yarns through the thickness direction of the 3-dimensional angle-interlock woven composite (3DAWC), the interlaminar shear strength and fracture toughness of the 3DAWC performance are higher than that of laminated composite. This feature leads the 3DAWC the great potential in the area of armor protection. Whereas the complexity of the microstructure of the 3DAWC limits the investigations of the ballistic impact property. There is much significance to study the procedure and damage mechanism of the projectile penetrating the 3DAWC as well as predicting the bulletproof performance of the 3DAWC.the experiment that a hemispherical cylindrical steel projectile penetrating the 3DAWC with seven striking velocities respectively was performed. Furthermore, the procedure of the projectile penetrating the 3DAWC was simulated with the commercial finite element (FE) software Ansys/Ls-dyna. In the process of simulating the projectile penetrating the 3DAWC,'Fiber Inclination Model'[Yang JM, Ma CL, Chou TW. Journal of Composite Materials,1986,20(9):472-484] was adopted to decompose the 3DAWC into four laminae which have the same fiber volume fraction and thickness as the 3DAWC. The projectile impacted the four laminae with striking velocity to get the final residual velocity of the projectile. Comparing the FEM result with that of experimental, it can be concluded as follows:(1):FEM can effectively predict the residual velocity of the projectile penetrating the 3DAWC; (2):the simulated damage configuration is similar with that of the experimental in the macroscopic view; (3):for the process of the projectile penetrating the 3DAWC, the velocity of the projectile decreased sharply at first, and then decreased smoothly, and penetrated through the 3DAWC with residual velocity finally.It could be concluded from the FEM results and experimental results that it is feasible and reliable to adopt'Fiber Inclination Model'to simulate the projectile penetrating the 3DAWC using FEM, which also provides evidence for the design of 3DAWC.