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The Effect of Tapering Region on Strength and Stability of Composite Wing

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The Effect of Tapering Region on Strength and

Stability of Composite Wing Structure
Amardeepa K.C.S1, Polagangu James2, Kotresh Gaddikeri3, Byji Varughese3, Ramesh Sundaram4
1
Scientist, 2Sr. Scientist, 3Principal Scientist, 4Sr. Principal Scientist

Advanced Composites Division

CSIR-National Aerospace Laboratories
Kodihalli, Bangalore-560017, India
a
amardeepa@nal.res.in

Abstract—This paper discusses the effect of tapering of skin in the wake region of landing bay cutout on the strength and stability of
composite wing structure of a small transport aircraft. Generally, such tapering regions are often ignored while carrying out global
stress analysis as it would be uneconomical to model such finer details and terming them to be minor artifacts of detail design. It has
been found that the skin locally had instability for the critical load case where skin tapers are ignored in the analysis. In this study, the
modelling technique of global composite wing is improved by including the taper regions in critical region of skin and spar around
landing well. The improved modelling technique did not affect the mesh size that was already generated for global stress analysis
except at the tapering regions. The challenge is to capture the skin taper in finite element model from 8.4 mm to 1.36 mm with a pair of
plies dropping at 3 mm intervals amounting to 19 pairs of ply drops and 63 mm overall taper length. It would not be prudent to include
either all 19 pairs of ply drops or ignore all of them as was the case earlier. A middle path is adopted wherein three intermediate
thicknesses are included in the analysis in a progressive manner such that no additional mass is added. It is shown that with the
inclusion of additional thicknesses in the tapered region, the criticality associated with the local instability of the skin disappeared. This
novel approach avoided the unnecessary design modification due to ignoring of large taper region while modelling.

Key words — Tapering region, Composite wing, civil aircraft, landing well, strength and stability, finite element analysis.

I. INTRODUCTION
Advanced composite structures are being extensively used in aerospace industries due to their high strength-to-weight and
stiffness-to-weight ratios. Thicker tapering zones are inevitable in large cocured composite structures where the thickness regions
are changing from smaller to larger thickness or vice versa due to design requirement. The tapering region is introduced by
terminating plies or by adding plies at different locations in composite components which are known as ply drop-off as shown in
Fig.1. Application of ply drop-off is common in aircraft co-cured composite structures like wing and fin, helicopter rotor blades,
wind blades. These composite structures have thick sections at root and thin section at tip as per design requirement, which can be
achieved through termination of plies at different locations. On the other hand, these plies may be inserted at the joints or
connections, access holes, lightning holes to locally strengthen the composite structures to increase the strength and stability to
make the joint safe.

This paper discusses the proper finite element modelling of tapering of skin in the wake region of landing bay cutout on the
strength and stability of composite wing structure of a small transport aircraft. The wing has a large size cutout at the landing well
region in the bottom skin (Fig. 2). Around the cutout region, the skin taper is drastic and the thickness of skin varies from 8.4 mm
to 1.36 mm with a pair of plies dropping at 3 mm intervals amounting to 19 pairs of ply drops and 63 mm overall taper length.
One of the major changes in the stress analysis stage is to capture the skin taper in finite element model. Generally, such tapering
regions are often ignored while carrying out global stress analysis as it would be uneconomical to model such finer details and
terming them to be minor artifacts of detail design. One of the structurally critical areas of the wing is the corner regions around
landing well in the bottom skin. These locations are found where sudden change in thickness happened due to higher thickness of
bottom skin near skin splicing, and sudden diversion of load path due to presence of cutouts. In these types of structures, sizing of
components without considering the tapering zones near the large cut out region may end up adding more weight to the overall
structure.

In this study, the effect of considering tapering zones on strength and stability of composite parts has been studied through
finite element analysis in two ways: firstly, a conventional modelling approach, secondly, an improved modelling approach. In the
second approach the modelling technique of wing is improved by including the tapering region in critical regions of skin and spar
around landing well. The improved modelling technique did not affect the mesh that was already generated for global stress
analysis except at the tapering regions.

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 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

Fig. 1. A typical ply drops Fig. 2. FE model of the wing structure

II. LITERATURE

There has been considerable amount of studies found in the literature on the various aspects of tapered composite structures.
From earlier research work published on tapering of composite layers on a small scale laminates are reviewed and presented.

A. Review papers

Priyanka [1] has presented a review on various studies of composite laminates with ply drop-off layers, tapered laminate
structures. This area of research is receiving much attention due to its potential for creating significant weight saving in the
engineering applications especially for aerospace applications. It was concluded that the research on the buckling, vibration,
progressive failure analysis, Interlaminar stress and delamination analysis, nonlinear analysis of composite laminated skew plates
with ply drop-off (tapered laminated skew plates) had not been studied yet with tapered laminated composite structures. Hoa and
Ganesan [2] reviewed research published on tapered laminated composite structures emphasising on the modelling and analysis
on interlaminar stress, delamination with parametric changes made in stacking sequence and materials. It was suggest in this
paper that the area of material non-linear analysis, finite-element modelling incorporating interlaminar characteristics, multiple
delamination in tapered laminate and optimization of tapered laminate composite structures including manufacturing constraints,
are yet to be studied.

B. Buckling analysis

Rasul S. M. A [3-5] has carried out buckling analysis on different types of tapered composite plates. They were based on first
order shear deformation theory and third order shear deformation theory of classical laminate theory. An extensive finite element
program was developed to study the dynamic and buckling analysis of variable thickness laminated composite beams using
conventional and advanced finite element formulations [4]. The analysis results showed that the mid-plane tapered gives low
value of natural frequencies in dynamic analysis response. The parametric studies were carried out on buckling analysis with four
different analytical approaches [5], employing the effect of stacking sequence, boundary condition, radius, tapered configuration
and geometric parameters of the plates. It was concluded that the tapered curved plates provide better design option by saving the
material without compromising the strength.

C. Strength analysis
Priyanka [6] had studied the effect of external and internal ply drop-off in composite laminate analysis, in which the ratios of
thickness to length on the ply drop under tensile load were examined. C.M.L.Wu and J.P.H.Webber [7] performed a linear static
analysis of tapered laminated plate of infinite width subjected to uniform in plane load, using quasi-three dimensional
isoperimetric finite-element models. Numerical results were given in for a single step plate with various arrangements for the ply
fibre direction. Very high peak stresses were predicted in the corner region of the step, but the stresses were reduced when a resin

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 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

fillet was modelled in the theoretical model for the step region. B.Varughese and A.Mukherjee [8-10] have carried out analysis on
composite structure with ply drop-off; they had developed a ply drop-off element using 1D element for analysis of tapered
laminate. This work had provided guidelines for ply drop-off in composites laminated structure to reduce stress concentration. In
addition, they [9] had also developed a ply drop-off element using 2D element for the analysis of tapered laminate. A local
analysis approach has been carried out near the vicinity of the drop off region to discuss the stress and strain distribution through
the thickness as well as along the laminate. The guidelines for the design of tapered laminated composite by terminating plies at
different locations to reduce stress concentration were bought out [10]. Vidyashankar and Murty [11] have presented a 3D finite
element analysis considering Tsai-Wu criterion to study the effect of ply drops and resin pockets on tapered laminates with the
influence of various parameters like ply drop-off taper angle and fibre orientation. The variation of stresses distribution and
displacement has been discussed.

D. Design Optimization:

F. -X. Irisarri, et al [12] had introduced the concept of stacking sequence table for the optimal design of laminated composite
structure with ply drops. It was concluded that the strength-related guidelines can be enforced without significantly penalizing the
stiffness behaviour and consequently the mass of the structure. Allegri et al [13] developed a preliminary design of tapered
composite structures on fracture mechanics by using optimization tool to study the effect of damage tolerance performance of
tapered laminates. Manne and Tsai [14] investigated the influence of sub-laminates made of multiple plies, various orientations,
combining one or more materials, drop zones on toughness of laminates. The orientation and thickness of each ply group in this
reference sub- laminate as well as its number of repetitions in the zones across the structures were optimized with the objective of
minimum weight subjecting to the constraints of strength, stiffness and manufacturing complexity. This new design methodology
was an attempt to combine the considerations of low weight and easy manufacturing requirements.

E. Testing:

Prashanth, Shivanda and Niranjan [15] investigated the tensile properties of epoxy resin composites materials reinforced with
glass fiber. The study had been carried out to understand the effect of fiber orientation and thickness of the laminates on material
property. It was concluded that the tensile strength is mainly depends on the fiber orientation and thickness of laminated polymer
composites. Studies were conducted by Carins et al, [16] on the variations of thickness required to optimize the design of modern
laminated composite structures. These thickness variations are accomplished by dropping of plies along the length. They had also
discovered various factors like thickness ply stacking sequences and ply drop geometries and manufacturing consideration for
design of composite structure with ply drops. Based on the studies some design rules for ply dropping were presented.
Experimental studies were carried out by Craig and Norman [17] on tapered laminates under compression load and predicted
failures or delamination near the dropped plies.
All the above publication showed the studies so far had been carried out only on a small size panel or laminates, not on a global
structural level. The load and boundary conditions applied on these small scale models need not necessarily represent the actual
loading system and constrains as prevailed in a global model. In this study the global wing structure is considered for carrying out
analytical studies by incorporating the concept of the modelling tapering zones. This paper gives the details of modelling of ply
drops at highly critical location near the landing well region.

III. STAEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The tapered region around the landing gear cutout was modelled initially by the conventional approach and the stress analysis
was carried out. The initial model contained only 8.4 mm and 1.36 mm thickness zones as shown in Fig.3, where the tapering
zone between these two zones of thickness were not included. The conventional approach of modelling posed strength and
stability issues around the landing well region due to sudden change in thickness. In the present study, the modeling is improved
by introducing tapering zones in the critical regions progressively dropping the plies as shown in Fig.4. The required modification
in the mesh size of the global wing is modelled as shown in Fig.5. The modelling is improved by incorporating the actual
thickness in tapered zones in the bottom skin, and a few locations in the front spar. The improved taper modelling is introduced
only at the critical locations. The mesh refinement at critical region has been carried out; such that not every drop-off zone is
modelled, but the required number of zones of thickness 6.8, 5.1, 3.4 mm between the maximum and minimum thickness of 8.4
and 1.36 mm respectively within the distance of 63 mm as shown in Fig.6. The stacking sequence in that zone is defined by the
plies that are available at the corresponding thickness of drop zone. In the new approach, the tapering regions around the landing
gear cutout and other critical region is accounted in the modelling. With this improved modelling of tapering zones, the finite
element analysis has been carried out for the critical design load cases.

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 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

Fig.3. Initial finite element model with conventional modelling technique at the tapering region

Fig. 4 Details of ply drops used in the FE Model

Fig. 5 FE model of the layer drops

Fig. 6 Sectional details of layer drop

IV. MATERIAL SYSTEM

In this study front and rear beams (Fig.2) of a composite wing are modelled with carbon UD prepreg properties regenerated for
material system of 914/34%UD160/AS4 12K/300 [18]. And the top and bottom skin of the composite wing are modelled with the
material properties regenerated for the material system defined by HS carbon UD fabric and EPOLAM 2063. The properties had
been obtained for the composite laminate fabricated by an innovative and patented fabrication process Vacuum Enhanced Resin
Infusion Technology [19] and given in Table 1.

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 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

TABLE 1. MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF COMPOSITE MATERIALS GENERATED FOR DIFFERENT MANUFACTURING PROCESS
914/34%UD160/AS4 UD Fabric and EPOLAM
S. No Description Unit
12K/300 2063
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
1 Young’s modulus along fiber direction, (EL) 130 130 G Pa
2 Young’s modulus along resin direction, (ET) 10 8 G Pa
3 Inplane shear modulus, (GLT) 5 3 G Pa
4 Inplane poison’s ratio, (ELT) 0.352 0.32
8 Thickness of ply 0.157 0.17 mm
9 Density 1.50 1.50 g/cm3

V. FINITE ELEMENT MODELLING

The pre and post processing of finite element model has been carried out using HyperMesh® and the solution is obtained by
MSC/NASATRAN®. The model has been divided into finite elements using 2D CQUAD4 and CTRIA3 shell elements that are
having all six degrees of freedom. Material modelling of MAT 8 with PCOMP card is chosen for all composite parts, the
modelling technique involved mesh refinement at the critical region of the bottom skin as shown in Fig.4. The ply drops are
modelled with the lay-up (±45/0/ 90). The plies were dropped off symmetrically in the decreasing order of stiffness from thick
section to thin section. The sectional detail of tapered region in the bottom skin is shown in Fig .5. The ply thickness and stacking
sequence are given Table 2.

TABLE 2. LAY-UP SEQUENCE

Thickness Layer No 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26
1.36 8 45 -45 0 90
3.06 18 45 -45 0 -45 0 0 45 0 90
3.4 20 45 -45 0 -45 0 0 45 0 0 90
5.1 30 45 -45 0 90 0 -45 0 0 45 45 0 -45 0 0 90
6.8 40 45 -45 0 90 0 -45 0 0 -45 0 45 0 0 45 0 0 -45 0 0 90
8.16 48 45 -45 0 90 0 -45 0 45 0 -45 0 45 0 -45 0 45 0 90 0 -45 0 45 0 90
8.84 52 45 -45 0 90 0 -45 0 45 0 90 0 -45 0 45 0 -45 0 45 0 90 0 -45 0 45 0 90

VI. LOADS AND BOUNDARY CONDITION

The aerodynamic load for the vertical dive case (Vd) case has been taken for the study, as it is one of the critical design load
case of the wing for a transport category aircraft. There are ten different aerodynamic load cases generated by aerodynamic team
for various manoeuvres as defined for the wing. The total load of individual critical load cases is given in Table.3 [20]. The loads
are provided in the form of concentrated point load acting within the skin panel between two adjacent interspar ribs. The point
loads are then connected to the adjacent interspar ribs using rigid body elements (RBE3) of NASTRAN® as shown in Fig. 7, as to
enable the load to transfer on to interspar ribs according to the distance from the point load. The wing is rigidly held at points
where it is connected to fuselage through vertical fittings (to transfer vertical load along Z-axis total four vertical fittings two on
either side of the wing located at station #3), and side fittings (to transfer side load along Y-axis, which are monolithically part of
two vertical fittings on left hand side wing) and drag force through drag attachment fitting (to transfer drag load along X-axis,
which a single fitting located right at the centre line of aircraft on rear spar). Global displacements along global axes X, Y and Z
directions are set to zero as to simulate the global constrain mechanism on half wing model as shown in Fig. 8. Since the analysis
has been carried out on half wing model, appropriate boundary conditions are applied at centre line of aircraft at rib #1, by
constraining the global displacement along Y-axis set to zero. These constraint mechanisms simulate the continuity of wing on
left and right side.

TABLE 3. DESIGN ULTIMATE LOAD APPLIED ON GLOBAL WING

load cases Va1 Va3 Vd3 Vg3 Roll 1 Roll 2 Roll 3 Roll 4 Roll 5 Roll 6
Load in (N) 124577 113223 126194 -45576 92024 85557 96739 89516 101135 97645

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 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

Fig. 7 Point loads are connected by rigid elements to adjacent interspar ribs Fig.8 Boundary Condition

VII. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The analysis has been carried out for ten different load cases shown in Table.3. Initially the analysis with conventional
modelling was carried out. The unstable regions found in the bottom skin around landing well cutout is shown in Fig.9 (a) for a
typical critical design load case with conventional modelling technique. The same region had been found unstable for all other
design load cases as well. The instability of bottom skin was observed due to not modelling the tapering regions around landing
well regions. Subsequent to this study, the modelling has improved and the ply drop regions are modelled wherever such instable
regions found in the global wing model both in skin and spar as discussed in section IV. Up on carrying out reanalysis, it has been
found that such unstable regions turned into stable regions in both skin and spar members as shown in Fig. 9 (b). With the above
modelling technique the structure has been analysed for linear buckling for ten different critical design load cases. The stability
parameter are measured in terms of Eigen values and presented for first 15 modes as shown in Fig. 10.

(a) Unstable skin before modelling tapered zones (b) Stable skin after modelling tapered zones
Fig. 9. Unstable and stable regions in the bottom skin before and after introducing taper region

2
 σ 11 
2
τ 12  Eq-(1)
 SL  +  S  ≤ 1.0
 

The strength parameter is expressed in terms of failure index calculated using modified Yamada-Sun’s failure criterion given in
Eq-(1). The failure index values calculated prior to modelling the tapering zones in critical regions were found to be more than
one, as reported in Table.4, for front beam and bottom skin respectively. In order to make them safe against strength requirement
without adding weight to the structure, similar tapering zones are created wherever such problems noticed in the bottom skin near
skin splice region. The strength parameters are reanalyzed and found that the strength values are improved to meet the

__________________________
Copyright © 2014 The Authors
 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

requirement as shown in Fig. 11 (a) & (b) for both front beam and bottom skin respectively for a typical critical design load case.
The same study has been carried out for all other design load case as well. The failure index values are given in Table 5 for each
case.

(a) Load case Va1 (b) Load case Va3 (c) Load case Vd3 (d) Load case Vg3

(e) Load case Roll1 (f) Load case Roll2 (g) Load case Roll3 (h) Load case Roll4

Conventional
modelling

Improved
modelling
(i) Load case Roll5 (j) Load case Roll6

Fig. 10 Eigen values obtained from finite element analysis before and after introducing taper region for critical design load cases

(a) failure index on the front beam (b) failure index on the bottom skin

Fig. 11 Contour plots of front beam and bottom skin after modelling the tapering region

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 Amardeepa K.C.S et al, 1A1, INCCOM-13, 14-15 Nov 2014, VSSC, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

TABLE 4. FAILURE INDEX VALUES BEFORE MODELLING THE TAPERING ZONES

load cases Va1 Va3 Vd3 Vg3 Roll 1 Roll 2 Roll 3 Roll 4 Roll 5 Roll 6
Bottom skin >1 >1 >1 >1 >1 >1 >1 >1 >1 >1
front beam >1 >1 >1 0.37 0.87 0.8 0.92 0.84 0.89 0.85

TABLE 5. FAILURE INDEX VALUES AFTER MODELLING THE TAPERING ZONES

load cases Va1 Va3 Vd3 Vg3 Roll 1 Roll 2 Roll 3 Roll 4 Roll 5 Roll 6
Bottom skin 0.97 0.89 0.90 0.43 0.76 0.69 0.78 0.71 0.77 0.73
front beam 0.70 0.64 0.67 0.29 0.57 0.52 0.61 0.56 0.64 0.62

VIII. CONCLUSION
The present analytical study addressed the effect of modelling tapering zones in a co-cured composite wing at the global level
finite element analysis. Generally, such tapering regions are often ignored while carrying out global stress analysis as it would be
uneconomical to model such finer details and terming them to be minor artifacts of detail design. In this study, the effect of finite
element modelling on the strength and stability at the tapered zones has been studied in two ways: firstly through a conventional
modelling approach and then through an improved modelling approach. The effect of improved modelling approach has been
highlighted in this paper by comparing with the conventional modelling approach. In conventional modeling approach, the
tapering zones were not modelled except 8.4 mm and 1.36 mm thickness region in the bottom skin, whereas in the improved
modeling approach additional tapering zones of 8.4, 6.80, 5.10, 3.40 and 1.36 mm are added. The additional tapering zones
helped to improve the strength and stability characteristics of composite wing. Therefore, it is worthwhile to adopt this modelling
technique for the analysis of composite wing or any other large aerospace co-cured composite structure right from the initial stage
of analytical studies. This may result in arriving at an optimum possible solution for least weight. Due to improved modelling
technique, the present analysis suggests no modification of composite wing. The observations made in this study can be taken
away for continuing structural optimization of a typical composite wing. The tapering regions in co-cured zones between skin-
spar, rib-spar and skin-ribs can be defined as separate design variables in the optimization study. It is proved in the present study
that the tapering zones add stiffness and strength in the critical zones without addition of weight. However, this can be verified by
optimization studies subsequently.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Authors thank Director and Head of Advanced Composites Division of CSIR-National Aerospace Laboratories Bangalore for
technical and financial support extended for completion of this work. The critical review and suggestions offered by all divisional
advisory committee members of Advanced Composites Division is acknowledged.

NOMENCLATURE

σ11 = Normal stress in lamina along fibre direction

τ12 = Shear stress in lamina
S = Allowable in-plane shear stress in lamina
SL= Allowable in-plane tensile stress in lamina
Va = Maneuvering speed
Vd = Vertical drive speed
Vg = Negative 1-g stall speed
Roll = Maneuvering performed by the flaps and aileron

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