Thermo-elastoplastic characteristics of heat-resisting functionally graded composite structures

Abstract

This paper is concerned with a study on thermo-elastoplastic characteristics of functionally graded composite. Compared to the classical layered composites, it shows a wide range of thermo-elastoplastic characteristics according to the choice of two major parameters, the thickness-wise volume fraction of constituents and the relative thickness ratio of the graded layer. Therefore, by selecting an appropriate combination of the two parameters, one is expected to design the most suitable heat-resisting composite for a given thermal circumstance. Here, we address the parametric investigation on its characteristics together with theoretical study on thermo-elastoplasticity and numerical techniques for its finite element approximations. Through the numerical experiments, we examine the influence of two parameters on the thermo-elastoplastic characteristics.