A multicontinuum progressive damage model for composite materials motivated by the kinetic theory of fracture

A conventional composite material for structural applications is composed of stiff reinforcing fibers embedded in a relatively soft polymer matrix, e.g. glass fibers in an epoxy matrix. Although composites have numerous advantages over traditional materials, the presence of two vastly different constituent materials has confounded analysts trying to predict failure. The inability to accurately predict the inelastic response of polymer based composites along with their ultimate failure is a significant barrier to their introduction to new applications.; Polymer based composite materials also tend to exhibit rate and time dependent failure characteristics. Lack of knowledge about the rate dependent response and progressive failure of composite structures has led to the current practice of designing these structures with static properties. However, high strain rate mechanical properties can vary greatly from the static properties.; The objective of this research is to develop a finite element based failure analysis tool for composite materials that incorporates strain rate hardening effects in the material failure model. The analysis method, referred to as multicontinuum theory (MCT) retains the identity of individual constituents by treating them as separate but linked continua. Retaining the constituent identities allows one to extract continuum phase averaged stress/strain fields for the constituents in a routine structural analysis.; Time dependent failure is incorporated in MCT by introducing a continuum damage model into MCT. In addition to modeling time and rate dependent failure, the damage model is capable of capturing the nonlinear stress-strain response observed in composite materials.