Experimental and numerical investigation on the failure behavior of multi-spar composite box under bending and shear

Abstract

Abstract Multi-spar composite boxes (MSCB) are common elements in structural design due to their high load capacity in different loading conditions. This paper presents an experimental and numerical investigation of the failure behavior of MSCB subjected to a combined bending-shearing load. Quadratic failure criteria and mixed-mode strain energy release rate criteria are used to predict the onset and propagation of damage at the inter-laminar interfaces of the MSCB, which was implemented into Abaqus/Explicit analysis via a user-defined material subroutine VUMT. At last, a good agreement between tests and numerical prediction was observed.