Performance Evaluation of Notched Biaxial Braided Composites

Braided composites have good properties in mutually orthogonal directions, more balanced properties than traditional tape laminates, and have potentially better fatigue and impact resistance due to the interlacing. Another benefit is reduced manufacturing cost by reducing part count. Because of these potential benefits braided composites are being considered for various applications ranging from primary/secondary structures for aerospace structures [1]. These material systems are gaining popularity, in particular for the small business jets, where FAA requires take off weights of 12,500 lb. or less. The new process, Vacuum Assisted Resin Transfer Molding (VARTM), is low cost, affordable and suitable for high volume manufacturing environment. Recently the aircraft industry has been successful in manufacturing wing flaps, using carbon fiber braids and epoxy resin and the VARTM process. To utilize these VARTM manufactured braided materials to the fullest advantage (and hence to avoid underutilization), it is necessary to understand their behavior under different loading and environmental conditions. This will reduce uncertainty and hence reduce the factor of safety in the design. It is well known fact that the strength of the composite structure reduces because of discontinuities and abrupt change in the cross-section. Accurate knowledge of strength and failure mechanism of notched and unnotched composites is very important for design of composite structures. This research addresses the behavior of notched braided composites under static tensile loading.