Characterization of strength of carbon fiber reinforced polymer composite based on micromechanics

The micro-mechanics of failure(MMF) is a micromechanics-based failure criterion for composites, which can be applied to design composite accurately and reliably. The strength and mechanical properties of unidirectional laminate of UTS50/E51 were measured by the static tensile loading and compressive loading tests as well as three points bending test. The micro-mechanics model was built to obtain the mechanical and residual thermal stress amplification factors for the key points in the fiber and matrix. The MMF parameters were characterized by using the stress amplification factors and the measured strengths of unidirectional laminate. The failure envelopes were made based on the MMF theory, and compared with that based on Tsai-Wu failure criterion. The carbon fiber reinforced plastic UTS50/E51 is used to demonstrate the application of MMF theory.