Fatigue damage model for fibre-reinforced polymers at different temperatures considering stress ratio effects

Abstract

Most of the existing fatigue models for fibre-reinforced polymers are limited to a specific use case. The investigation presented in this paper provides a progressive fatigue damage model that can be used for fatigue analysis of composite structures under general loading conditions and at arbitrary ambient temperatures. The model is based on an existing approach that already considers mean stress and degradation effects. This model is extended for predicting fatigue damage at general loading conditions. To incorporate the effect of ambient temperatures, material and model parameters are defined temperature dependent. The new model is validated using two composite materials and different loading conditions as well as under both room and high temperatures. The model achieves a good prediction quality for the analysed materials, loading conditions and temperatures. This demonstrates that the proposed model is not limited to a specific use case but is able to simulate fatigue of laminated composites under general loading conditions.