Abstract:
Basalt fiber-reinforced polymer (BFRP) laminates are prone to surface scratches and shallow notches during manufacturing and service. Under sustained loading, these initial defects may propagate and eventually lead to fracture failure. To investigate the quasi-brittle fracture behavior of BFRP laminates, three-point bending (3-p-b) tests were conducted on specimens with different notch depths. Based on the boundary effect model (BEM), the thickness of a single fiber fabric ply was introduced as the characteristic composite unit C_\textch to establish a fracture parameter calculation method. The fracture evolution process was further analyzed using load-displacement curves. A normal distribution was adopted to statistically analyze the tensile strength f_\textt and fracture toughness K_\textIC , and the fracture parameters were predicted and validated based on the experimental data of different specimen groups. The results show that the fracture process of BFRP laminates can be divided into three stages: linear deformation, softening, and failure. The tensile strength and fracture toughness were f_\textt =137.68 MPa and K_\textIC =7.54 MPa·m
1/2, respectively. Compared with the least-squares fitting result, the relative error was 0.94%, and 95% of the experimental data fell within the confidence interval. In addition, the fracture parameters exhibited a non-monotonic variation with the crack-thickness ratio \alpha . The predicted fracture parameters agreed well with the experimental results for each specimen group, with relative errors below 1%.