Geometrical And Mathematical Characterization Of 3-D Orthogonal Woven Fabric Architecture

In 3-D orthogonal woven fabric, warp yarns, weft yarns and Z-yarns are interlocked mutually perpendicular each other. There are no crimps in warp yarn, weft yarns and Z-yarns. The warp and weft yarns provide the highest in-plane stiffness and strength, while the binder yarns which run across the thickness direction provide the stability of fabric architecture. The excellent integrity of 3-D orthogonal woven composite allows the tailoring of properties for specific applications and shows better delamination resistance and damage tolerance, therefore the fabric is used widely in engineering, aerospace, sports equipment, automobile and architecture. The 3-D orthogonal woven composite has higher fracture toughness and impact damage tolerance along thickness direction.The purposes of this paper are to investigate the structural characterization of 3-D orthogonal woven fabric and to reconstruct micro-structure model of the 3-D orthogonal woven fabric. The main jobs are: (1) Preparation of the 3-D orthogonal fabric: the E-glass fiber tows were used for warp, weft yarns and Z-yarns. (2) A series of continuous cross-sections of 3-D orthogonal woven fabric were obtained from cutting the 3-D fabric along warp and weft direction. The cross-sections were photographed to analyze the cross-section shape and spatial configuration of yarns. (3)Parametric equations were established to characterize the sizes of the yarn cross-sections and spatial crimps of the warp, weft and Z-yarns.(4) Based on the 3-D drawing software package Pro/E, the yarn model,the unit-cell model and large size architecture model of the 3-D orthogonal woven fabric were re-constructed. (5)The good agreement between the architecture model and the actual structure of the fabric in the cross-sectional shape and fiber volume fraction proves that this model can precisely describe fabric structure. The research method and results provided in this paper can lead the 3-D orthogonal woven composite to be designed effectively and also provide a new mesoscale model for the ballistic protection design of the 3-D orthogonal woven composite.