International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012

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International Journal of Mechanical Sciences

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijmecsci

Influence of in-plane tensile preloads on impact responses of composite

laminated plates
Cunxian Wang a, Tao Suo a,b,c,∗, Chao Hang d, Yulong Li a,b,c, Pu Xue a,b, Qiong Deng a,b
a
School of Aeronautics, Northwestern Polytechnical University, 127 West Youyi Road, Beilin District, Xi’an Shaanxi, 710072, China
b
Fundamental Science on Aircraft Structural Mechanics and Strength Laboratory, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an 710072, China
c
Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Impact Dynamics and Engineering Application(IDEA), Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an 710072, China
d
Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China Ltd, Shanghai 200126, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Keywords: Ballistic impact tests on composite laminated plates were carried out with a preloading device to investigate the
Laminated plates impact responses at nominal velocities of 50 m/s and 70 m/s. Not only the center locations but also the near-edge
In-plane preload regions of the laminated plates were impacted. Furthermore, finite element models were developed using three-
Impact response
dimensional solid elements and cohesive elements, and a user subroutine VUMAT of Ladevèze failure criterion
Delamination
was used in support of simulations in ABAQUS Explicit, providing detailed insights into the characteristics of
Interlaminar stress
delamination and target response. Results showed that there was a significant promotion of delamination resis-
tance in the center location when applying appropriate preloads, but some weakening parts were also generated
over large areas at the same time. A competition mechanism between the increased bending stiffness induced
enhancement effect and the interlaminar stresses induced weakening effect was proposed to explain the influence
of the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads on the delamination resistance of laminated plate. The work in this study
may provide guidance for the impact resistance design of composite aircraft wing skin.

1. Introduction
Composites are widely used in aeronautics and astronautics due to
their advantages such as excellent mechanical properties, high specific
strength, good stiffness and light-weight [1]. Since aeronautic structures
tend to suffer impact from falling tools, gravel, birds, hail and weapon
debris during the flight [2], the ballistic tests on composites become
more extensive in preliminary research. Currently the carbon fiber rein-
forced composites are sensitive to impact, and the impact damages such
as delamination, cracking in the matrix and fracture of brittle fibers can
significantly degrade the mechanical property, even result in a reduction
of the structural integrity [3, 4].
Over years, the efforts to explore the impact responses of compos-
ites almost never stopped. It has attracted more than forty years of
widespread concern on the damage detection and analysis. By evalu-
ating the bearing capacity and determining the failure characteristics
of composites, the designing of structures manufactured by compos-
ites can be guided eventually [5–7]. Generally, for carbon fiber rein-
forced composites under impact loading, the main failure mechanisms
were known as local deformation, delamination, fiber breakage and
debonding [8]. Takashima et al. [9] and Johnson and Sims [10] car-
ried out some tests, in which the layer angles were changed to increase
the anisotropy of composites, and results clearly showed typical fail-
ure modes of CFRP when subjected to impact loading. Studies also con-
cerned the anisotropic damage especially for the shape and distribu-
tion of delamination [11, 12]. Yew and Kendrick [13] developed the
cross section staining method and ultrasonic C-scan method to detect
the damage of composites after impact, and put forward that the im-
pact damage of composites was anisotropic. With the development of
computer technology, finite element analysis has been widely used in
most investigations on impact response of composites. Riccio et al. [14,
15] conducted a numerical study on the impact behavior of a stiffened
composites panels with omega shaped stringers, and the experimental
non-destructive evaluation techniques of impact damage was also inves-
tigated. Zhang et al. [16, 17] developed a series of numerical methods
to study the impact failure behavior of composite structures, with de-
tailed descriptions and discussions on matrix cracking, free-edge effect
and interface delamination of braided composites. Zhang and coworkers
[18, 19] developed a multi-scale framework to model the impact failure
behavior of composites subjected to high-speed impact, and predicted
the failure pattern and impact threshold well.
Since 1990s, the researches around the effects of preloads on com-
posites were widely concerned since the aeronautic structures exten-
sively suffer from high-velocity impact under a certain preloaded state.

∗
Corresponding author at: School of Aeronautics, Northwestern Polytechnical University, 127 West Youyi Road, Beilin District, Xi’an Shaanxi, 710072, China.
E-mail address: suotao@nwpu.edu.cn (T. Suo).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmecsci.2019.105012
Received 1 April 2019; Received in revised form 27 June 2019; Accepted 9 July 2019
Available online 11 July 2019
0020-7403/© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al.
Advisory Circular 20–107B pointed out that there was a need to con-
sider the actual loads (tension, compression, or torsion) on the analyses
of unexpected impact damage when designing the structures. With the
guidance, lots of attentions were devoted to the influences of preloads on
impact response of composites. Research by Chiu et al. [20] conducted
some ballistic impact tests and found that the impact resistance of com-
posites can be reduced by large tensile preload. Afterwards, Kelkar et al.
[21] and Nettles [22] applied several kinds of tensile preloads on com-
posites to guarantee that no preloads induced damage was generated be-
fore impact, and results showed that the impact resistance of composites
was improved by appropriate tensile preloads. Furthermore, researches
on impact responses of composites with compressive preloads were con-
ducted to gain additional insight into the effect of preloads. Zhang et al.
[23] presented that the compressive preload tended to cause the buck-
ling for relatively thin composite plates, which may bring the complex-
ity to this research. Subsequent efforts by Heimbs et al. [24–28] reduced
the complexity and successfully kept the compressive preload at a stable
level, and then put forward that the stiffness and impact damage resis-
tance of composites were reduced by the compressive preloads. Previous
studies are reasonable to describe the effects of preloads on composites
by analyzing the impact responses of center location, but the near-edge
impact performances are rarely investigated. Actually, not only the cen-
ter location but also the near-edge region of composite structures may
suffer impact loads at times, like gravel impact or debris impact on the
aircraft wing skin. The impact responses of preloaded composites, espe-
cially for the damages of preloaded carbon fiber reinforced laminated
plates, are still far from full understanding.
In the present work, in support of designing the composite wing
skin, the ballistic impact responses of preloaded carbon fiber reinforced
laminated plates were investigated by using both experimental and nu-
merical method. The purpose was to identify and analyze both con-
Fig. 1. Strain measurement scheme, clamping system and test devices; (a) strain measurement scheme; (b) preloading device; (c) schematic diagram of testing
device–pneumatic gun system.
International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012
cepts and mechanisms of the preloads induced damage. A special test
rig was designed to apply biaxial in-plane tensile preloads on [0/90]8
and [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plates. Afterwards, a series of ballis-
tic impact tests were performed launching steel sphere against both the
preloaded and unloaded laminated plates. In the experiments, both the
center location and the near-edge region of the laminated plates were
impacted by using a gas gun, and the ultrasonic C-scan was applied to de-
tect the delamination. Moreover, numerical simulations and analytical
modeling were conducted to gain additional insight into the character-
istics of damage generated from the impact. A user subroutine VUMAT
with revised Ladevèze failure criterion was developed and implemented
in ABAQUS Explicit, and the cohesive elements were employed to an-
alyze delamination. By comparing the experimental and numerical re-
sults, the influences of preloads on laminated plates were investigated
and discussed. Both the in-plane preloads induced interlaminar stresses
and stress stiffening were used to explain the special phenomenon. The
work can help to obtain a better understanding of the impact responses
of preloaded laminated plates, also provides guidance for the designing
of composites aircraft wing skin.
2. Material preparation and experimental procedure
2.1. Material preparation
In the ballistic impact tests, the material used was T700/epoxy resin
M10R laminated plates with two types of stacking sequences which were
depicted as [0/90]8 and [0/90/+45/−45]2S . All specimens were cut to
plates with size of 300 × 300 mm2 and attached to two 30 mm width
support frames on all parallel sides, thus leaving a 240 × 240 mm2 free
target area, as shown in Fig. 1(a). The water jet cutting was employed
to avoid the initial damage as possible. Fig. 1(b) showed the preloading
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012

Table 1
Experimental conditions.

NO. Layups Impact point Off-central distance [x, y] (mm) Actual Velocity(m/s) Pre-strain

1–2# [0/90/+45/−45]2S Point 1 [−5, 0] (1#), [13, −5] (2#) 49.33(1#), 68.72(2#) N/A
3–4# [0/90/+45/−45]2S Point 1 [8, −2] (3#), [7, −2] (4#) 52.45(3#), 68.95(4#) 1000𝜇𝜀
5–6# [0/90]8 Point 1 [9, 0] (5#), [14, 0] (6#) 49.42(5#), 68.18(6#) N/A
7–8# [0/90]8 Point 1 [28, −9] (7#), [12, −7] (8#) 49.33(7#), 69.51(8#) 1000𝜇𝜀
9–10# [0/90/+45/−45]2S Point 2 [5, 67] (9#), [2, 64] (10#) 51.34(9#), 50.78(10#) 1000𝜇𝜀
11–12# [0/90]8 Point 2 [2, 69] (11#), [4, 66] (12#) 47.51(11#), 50.42(12#) 1000𝜇𝜀

device which consisted the outer frame, loading blocks and bolts. The
specific in-plane tensile preloads can be applied by adjusting the bolts
connecting the outer frame with the loading blocks. A total of six strain
gauges were stacked on the back side of the laminated plate not only
to measure the in-plane strain histories during impact but also to give
feedback for preloading control before impact. The C-scan tests were
conducted on the target plates after applying different biaxial in-plane
preloads, and results showed that there was no initial damage on the
laminated plates when no more than 2000𝜇𝜀 biaxial pre-strain was ap-
plied. Therefore, considering the stress concentration of opening holes
on the plates and the cyclic-loading results in the material tests which
were used to support the parameters determination of Ladevèze model,
about 1000𝜇𝜀 biaxial pre-strain was applied on the laminated plate in
the ballistic tests.
2.2. Instruments and measurements
Ballistic impact tests were performed with a one stage gas gun as
shown in Fig. 1(c). The gas gun consisted of a pressure vessel with a
volume of 0.35 m3 , a gun barrel with a length of 5.2 m and an inner di-
ameter of 25 mm. Steel spheres with a diameter of 10 mm corresponding
mass of 4.1 g were selected as projectiles to conduct the experiments.
Each projectile was supported by a wooden shell and accelerated by
compressive air in the gun barrel. During the impact, the wooden shell
was removed by the shell removal device, which can help to avoid some
influences on the measurement accuracy of grating laser velocimeter.
Meanwhile, two V711 high-speed cameras were installed in the experi-
ments where the frontal one was used to capture the impact location and
the back one was applied for capturing the normal deflection, respec-
tively. In addition, both the center location (point 1) and the near-edge
region (point 2) of the laminated plates were impacted at the velocities
of 50 m/s and 70 m/s. After the ballistic impact tests, the delamination
area of each laminated plate was measured by using a PAC ultrasonic
C-scan. Table 1 listed all the experimental conditions for ballistic impact
tests.
3. Experimental results
The in-plane strain histories of point 1 and 2 on the target plates
2#, 4#, 6# and 8# are illustrated in Fig. 2. As shown, the peak in-
plane strains of preloaded target plates are relatively smaller than those
of unloaded target plates at velocities of 50 m/s and 70 m/s. In addi-
tion, no matter which impact velocity is applied, the in-plane strains
of [0/90]8 plates are still smaller than those of [0/90/+45/−45]2S
plates. Taking the target plates 6# and 8# as the examples, the peak
strain of unloaded plate 6# impacted at velocity of 70 m/s is close
to 4500𝜇𝜀; however, the peak strain of preloaded plate 8# is only
3000𝜇𝜀.
It is deserved to be noticed that the strain histories from strain gauge
2 show a tendency that a very small in-plane tensile wave arrives at
the strain gauges right after the contact of steel projectile with the tar-
get plates. However, since the peak value of the tensile wave is much
weaker than that of following stress wave, it is difficult to observe this
small tensile signal. After the small in-plane tensile wave, a compres-
sive component of an oncoming transverse flexural wave arrives at the
strain gauges, followed by a large tensile component of the transverse
flexural wave [29]. Actually, if the projectile exactly impacts the point
1 where the strain gauges 1 and 2 are mounted, the first in-plane ten-
sile wave and the following compressive component of the transverse
flexural wave will not be collected by the strain gauges 1 and 2. In the
ballistic impact tests, the impact locations are more or less deviated from
the point 1 (see Fig. 2(e) and Table 1), thus causing the in-plane ten-
sile and compressive components of the transverse flexural waves can
be detected during the impact. Theoretically, the largest flexural wave
component is supposed to be the most important factor which results in
delamination.
Fig. 3(a) shows the delamination and peak deflection under differ-
ent impact conditions. As shown, for the laminated plates with same
layups and preloads, higher impact energy tends to result in larger de-
lamination area and larger deflection, and the [0/90/+45/−45]2S plates
are found to exhibit more delamination than [0/90]8 plates when sub-
jected to almost exactly the same impact load. Moreover, results also
show that the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads (1000𝜇𝜀 biaxial pre-
strain) can enhance the delamination resistance of the center location
for both [0/90]8 plates and [0/90/+45/−45]2S plates. It can be sup-
posed that the limited in-plane tensile preloads can improve the bending
stiffness of plates to some extent, thus causing the decreased peak val-
ues of in-plane strains and normal deflections during the impact. Such
phenomenon which is called stress stiffening can also be observed in
tightropes and taut drums.
In Fig. 3(b), the delamination and peak deflections of the near-edge
region (point 2) are illustrated to make contrast to the results from cen-
ter location. Results show that both the [0/90/+45/−45]2S plates and
the [0/90]8 plates appear more delamination when changing the im-
pact location from point 1 to point 2 even though the peak deflections
decrease at the same time. In addition, the strain variation signals from
strain gauge 3 and 4 on 3# and 9# plates are illustrated in Fig. 4(a)
and (b). Results show that the peak values of in-plane strain on 9# plate
are higher than those of 3# plate, causing by the fact that the impact
location of 9# plate is near to the strain gauge 3 and 4. However, the
peak in-plane strains of strain gauge 3 and 4 on 9# plate are still smaller
than those of strain gauge 1 and 2 on 3# plate, which is corresponding
with the changing trends of peak deflections between 3# plate and 9#
plate, as shown in Fig. 3(b). Moreover, the C-scan results indicate the
shapes of delamination are elongated along the direction which perpen-
dicular to the nearest edge, as shown in Fig. 4(c). Previous works and
the results from the plates 1#−8# indicate that the stiffening effect in-
duced by the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads can reduce the degree of
bending deformation and then typically prevent delamination propaga-
tion [30]. Nevertheless, the results from plates 9#−12# show different
tendency by only changing the impact location. Consequently, the ef-
fect of biaxial in-plane preloads on delamination resistance cannot be
simply judged by considering the results from the ballistic impact tests
in which only the center locations of the target plates are impacted. In
the following section, the influences of biaxial in-plane preloads on de-
lamination at different impact locations will be discussed by combining
with simulation results.
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012

Fig. 2. Strain variation signals and typical high-speed photographs; (a–b) strain signals of 2# and 4# plates; (c-d) strain signals of 6# and 8# plates; (e) high-speed
photographs for 8# plate impacted by steel sphere.
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012

Fig. 3. Delamination and peak deflection of [0/90/+45/−45]2S plates and [0/90]8 laminated plates; (a) laminated plates impacted at the center loacation; (b)
laminated plates with different impact loacation.

Fig. 4. Strain variation signals of 3# and 9# plates and C-scan results; (a) strain gauge 3; (b) strain gauge 4; (c) C-scan results of 3#, 9#, 7#, 12# plate.

4. Numerical modeling and validation
4.1. Finite-Element models and material models
Since the excellent nonlinear analysis ability of commercial software
ABAQUS, different finite element (FE) models were developed to simu-
late the detailed impact responses of these target plates. The mesh pat-
tern and size dependency were examined at first for purpose of finding
an optimized mesh for stability, accuracy, and efficiency of the impact
analysis. Noted that the full FE models were used instead of one-quarter
models in the simulation, which is caused by the fact that element ero-
sion would occur unsymmetrically once impact failure initiates because
of the presence of off-axial lamina and the variation of impact locations.
All the laminated plates were modeled with three-dimensional solid el-
ements with reduced integration (C3D8R) and 8-node hexahedral cohe-
sive elements (COH3D8) while the projectile was set as a rigid body.
The in-plane mesh pattern was kept to be uniform as well as each ply
was modeled with one element in the thickness direction. In detail, each
model consisted sixteen solid plies (0.1 mm) and fifteen cohesive plies
(0.001 mm), and the mesh density was gradually coarsening from the
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al.
Fig. 5. Strain distributions of preloaded laminated plates.
inner region (the potential impact region) to the outer. Mesh transitions
between regions were good enough to prevent stress wave reflections
from the boundaries of regions. Simply refining the mesh did not neces-
sarily improve the accuracy since the material model parameters were
calibrated for a specific mesh size and the mode of failure changed dur-
ing the simulation. Furthermore, there was no clear theoretical guide-
line on the required mesh density for the range of impacts covered in
the simulation. Considering the softening effects and mesh dependent
failure algorithms, the only reasonable methodology to find the most
appropriate mesh size was trial and error while comparing the results
against a controlled test data. Subsequently, it was possible to arrive at
an optimum after experimenting with different meshing and draw some
guidelines for that particular case. Thus, each target thickness was mod-
eled with one mesh densities in this study while many more were ex-
perimented on during the calibration runs. A viscous based stabilization
method was used during the simulations to prevent hourglass modes of
the reduced integration elements. Contact behavior between the projec-
tile and the target was attained by using a penalty based single surface
type contact algorithm that uses a nodal constraint formulation with an
element erosion scheme.
A more sophisticated material model was necessary for the targets
to simulate ballistic impact responses, where the global Ladevèze con-
stitutive model [31] was employed to describe the impact response of
laminated plates. Since the global Ladevèze constitutive model can de-
scribe the fiber-matrix coupling effect, fiber brittle rupture, matrix micro
cracking, debonding of fiber/matrix and effect of strain rate, a user sub-
routine VUMAT with revised Ladevèze failure criterion was employed
in ABAQUS to predict the damage evolution of laminated plates. Ta-
ble A.1 lists the Ladevèze constitutive parameters of the unidirectional
carbon-epoxy material.
Theoretically, there are some difficulties to determine interlaminar
stiffness due to the relatively thin thickness of cohesive layer. Thus, the
method from Turon et al. [32] was employed to calculate the interlam-
inar normal stiffness (Knn ) and two interlaminar shear stiffness (Kss and
Ktt ):
𝛼𝐸33
𝐾𝑛𝑛 = The simulation results (delamination and peak deflection) of the
𝑇
2𝛼𝐺13
𝐾𝑠𝑠 = and 2000𝜇𝜀) are shown in Fig. 6(a) and (b) in which the negative pre-
𝑇
2𝛼𝐺23
𝐾𝑡𝑡 = (1)
𝑇 ries of the corresponding points from the simulations are illustrated to
International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012
where T is the thickness of single laminate layer, and 𝛼 denotes an ex-
perience parameter, 1 represents the fiber direction; 2 represents the
transverse direction; 3 represents the through-thickness direction. The
effective stiffness for the composite along the thickness direction can be
measured by
𝐸33
𝐸𝑒𝑓 𝑓 = (2)
1
1+ 𝛼
Considering the accuracy and time cost of simulation, 𝛼 is taken as
50, thus causing the loss of stiffness due to the existence of the interface
is less than 2% [32]. The strength of layers can also be calculated by in-
plane parameters based on the method from De Moura [33]. In addition,
the mixed mode of secondary stress criterion was selected to estimate
the initiation of delamination as well as the coupling secondary critical
energy release rate criterion was employed to simulate the evolution
of delamination. Table A.2 lists the constitutive parameters of cohesive
element which are calculated by using the anisotropic parameters.
4.2. Method of applying preloads
The impact analysis of preloaded laminated plate was performed by
establishing a preloading step followed by an impacting step. However,
the explicit solver faced the influence of the inertia force when apply-
ing the in-plane preloads, thus requested a smooth loading method to
conduct the quasi-static preloading step [34]. Consequently, the dis-
placement loading mode combined with smooth step amplitude curve
were employed to avoid the fluctuations caused by discontinuous load-
ing rate. Fig. 5 illustrates the in-plane strain distributions along hori-
zontal and vertical direction of the preloaded laminated plates. Results
show that, even the strain distributions near the edge show some ups
and downs, but those of most regions especially for the center location
(point 1) and the near-edge region (point 2) were practically uniform
and acceptable. After checking the strain distributions and the value
of in-plane preloads, the restart analysis was conducted to support the
impacting step.
4.3. Numerical results and model validation
laminated plates with different in-plane preloads (−1000𝜇𝜀, 0, 1000𝜇𝜀
strain represents the in-plane compressive preloads while the positive
pre-strain means in-plane tensile preloads. Moreover, the strain histo-
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al.
Fig. 6. Delamination areas, peak deflections and strain histories of the laminated plates; (a) delamination areas under various preload; (b) peak deflections under
various preload; (c-d) comparison of strain histories between experimental and numerical results at corresponding points of [0/90]8 laminated plate 8#.
compare with the experimental results, which is supported to the further
validation of the numerical model, as shown in Fig. 6(c) and (d). Results
show that not only the level but also the tendency of the strain histories
from simulations coincides well with the experimental results. In addi-
tion, both the delamination areas and peak deflections decrease with
the increase of in-plane tensile preloads. It can be concluded that the
in-plane tensile preloads tend to improve the delamination resistance of
the laminated plates at the center location while the in-plane compres-
sive preloads seem to promote the generation of delamination. More-
over, the comparisons of delamination shapes are illustrated in Fig. 7,
in which SDEG means the scalar stiffness degradation in ABAQUS. Re-
sults also indicates that the results simulated by FE model show good
agreement with those obtained by the C-scan measurements, proving
that the simulation method in this study is appropriate and feasible.
5. Effect of in-plane tensile preload on delamination
Not only the experimental results but also the numerical results in-
dicate the delamination resistance of the center location on laminated
plates tends to be improved by applying the biaxial in-plane tensile
preloads, which was also presented by Nettles [22] and Zhang et al.
[23]. However, results from the experiments also show that the delami-
nation areas are increased when the impact location moves to the near-
edge region in spite of the same in-plane tensile preloads and impact
loads are applied.
Theoretically, it can be considered that the bending stiffness of lam-
inated plates is enhanced to a certain extent by applying the in-plane
tensile preloads, which is supported by the reduced peak in-plane strains
and decreased peak deflections during the impact. Therefore, the biaxial
International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012
in-plane tensile preloads can help to reduce the bending degree of the
laminated plates under normal impact load to some extent, thus plays
a positive role in the delamination resistance of the laminated plates.
However, the effect of interlaminar stresses between adjacent layers in-
duced by biaxial in-plane tensile preloads cannot be ignored. Since the
difference of ply orientation between each two adjacent layers, there
always exist tensile-shear coupling or the mismatch of Poisson’s ratio
in the laminated plate. Consequently, as shown in Fig. 8(a) and (b), the
biaxial in-plane tensile preloads tend to induce different degrees of inter-
laminar stresses between adjacent layers in the laminated plate before
impact, which also plays an important role in delamination resistance
of preloaded laminated plates when subjected to impact loading.
By using the layerwise laminate theory (LWT) method from Robbins
and Reddy [35] and the first-order shear deformation theory, the dis-
placements of each random point in laminated plates, i.e. u, v and w,
can be expressed as
𝑛+1
∑
𝑢(𝑥, 𝑦, 𝑧) = 𝑢0 (𝑥, 𝑦) + 𝑧𝜑𝑥 (𝑥, 𝑦) + 𝑈𝑘 (𝑥, 𝑦)𝜓𝑘 (𝑧)
𝑘=1
𝑛+1
∑
𝑣(𝑥, 𝑦, 𝑧) = 𝑣0 (𝑥, 𝑦) + 𝑧𝜑𝑦 (𝑥, 𝑦) + 𝑉𝑘 (𝑥, 𝑦)𝜓𝑘 (𝑧)
𝑘=1
𝑛+1
∑
𝑤(𝑥, 𝑦, 𝑧) = 𝑤0 (𝑥, 𝑦) + 𝑊𝑘 (𝑥, 𝑦)𝜓𝑘 (𝑧) (3)
𝑘=1
where u0 , v0 and w0 represent the initial displacements of each
point, U, V and W denote the displacements of the correspond-
ing points on the specified layer, n is the total number of lay-
ers, 𝜓 k (z) is the first order Lagrange interpolation functions which
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012

Fig. 7. Comparisons of delamination shapes between experimental and numerical results.

C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012

Fig. 8. Schematic diagram of interlaminar stresses; (a) applying biaxial in-plane tensile preloads; (b) preloads induced interlaminar stresses; (c–d) typical interlaminar
stresses of composite laminated plates with stacking sequences of [0/90]8 and [0/90/+45/−45]2S .

can be defined as 𝜓 k (z) = (z − zk )/(zk + 1 − zk ),zk − 1 ≤ z ≤ zk and tion, and then gradually converts from compressive stress into tensile
𝜓 k (z) = (zk + 1 − z)/(zk + 1 − zk ),zk ≤ z ≤ zk + 1 , for z=else, 𝜓 k (z) = 0. stress when changing from 0.75b to the edge. Besides, the interlami-
Besides, the displacements of the corresponding point for isoparamet- nar shear stresses produced by in-plane tensile preloads in the preload-
𝑚
∑ 𝑚
∑ 𝑚
∑ ing process can be considered as two important factors affecting the
ric element can be depicted as 𝑈 = 𝑈 𝑖 𝜃𝑖 , 𝑉 = 𝑈 𝑖 𝜃𝑖 , 𝑊 = 𝑈 𝑖 𝜃𝑖 ,
𝑖=1 𝑖=1 𝑖=1 delamination resistance of laminated plates when subjected to impact
where m is the number of nodes for one unit, Ui , Vi , Wi are the loading. Theoretically, the interfacial strength of the laminated plates
displacements of the corresponding node. By using Lagrange isopara- are weakened by the interlaminar shear stresses. Thus, the in-plane ten-
metric element with 3 nodes, 𝜃 i can be calculated as 𝜃1 = 12 𝜇(𝜇 − 1), sile preloads induced interlaminar shear stresses can be assumed to pro-
𝜃 2 = (1 + 𝜇)(1 − 𝜇), and 𝜃3 = 12 𝜇(𝜇 + 1), where − 1 ≤ 𝜇 ≤ 1. The values mote the delamination of laminated plates when subjected to impact
of 𝜀x and 𝜀y are equal to 1000𝜇𝜀 which refer to the in-plane preloads loading.
applied in the experiments. The other strains of the corresponding point For further discussion, Fig. 9(a) illustrates the stiffness degradations
on the specified layer can be calculated by ignoring w0 (x,y) when tak- of all the cohesive elements on the [0/90/+45/−45]2S preloaded lam-
ing a derivative to z, as shown in Eq. (4). At last, 𝜎 z , 𝜏 yz , 𝜏 zx can be inated plate 3# before impact by using the toggle global translucency
obtained by employing the classical laminated plate theory [36]. Based function in ABAQUS. Results show that most of cohesive elements on
on MATLAB and the parameters of anisotropic model from Table A.2, the preloaded laminated plates appear different degrees of stiffness
the interlaminar stresses were calculated by setting the length and width degradation before impact, which can help to explain the different ten-
of the laminated plate as 2b. dencies of delamination resistance between center location impact and
near-edge region impact by combining the effect of increased bending
𝑛+1
∑ 𝑚
𝜕𝜓 ∑ stiffness.
𝜀𝑧 = ( 𝑘 )( 𝑊𝑘𝑖 𝜃𝑖 )
𝑘=1
𝜕𝑧 𝑖=1 For [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plate 3#, the impact location is
𝑚 𝑛+1 𝑚
near to the center location where the initial stiffness degradation is rel-
𝜕 ∑ 𝑖 ∑ 𝜕 ∑ 𝑖 atively small (almost zero). Consequently, in the center location, the
𝛾𝑥𝑦 = 𝑧 ⋅ ( 𝜑 𝑥 𝜃𝑖 ) + 𝜓𝑘 ⋅ ( 𝑈 𝑘 𝜃𝑖 )
𝜕𝑦 𝑖=1 𝑘=1
𝜕𝑦 𝑖=1 weakening effect of interlaminar stresses on delamination resistance
𝑚 𝑛+1
[ 𝑚 𝑚
] is negligible, thus making the increased bending stiffness becomes the
∑ ∑ 𝜕 𝜓𝑘 ∑ 𝑖 𝜕 ∑
𝛾𝑦𝑧 = 𝜑𝑖𝑦 𝜃𝑖 + ( 𝑉𝑘 𝜃𝑖 ) + 𝜓𝑘 ( 𝑊𝑘𝑖 𝜃𝑖 ) dominant factor which can influence the delamination resistance of the
𝑖=1 𝑘=1
𝜕𝑧 𝑖=1 𝜕𝑦 𝑖=1
preloaded laminated plates during impact. It should be noted that the
𝑚 𝑛+1
[ 𝑚
]
∑ ∑ 𝜕 𝜓𝑘 ∑ 𝑖 delamination area is relatively small and locates at the center location
𝛾𝑧𝑥 = 𝜑𝑥 + 𝜑𝑖𝑥 𝜃𝑖 + ( 𝑈 𝑘 𝜃𝑖 ) (4) since the relatively small impact energy of projectile. Therefore, the de-
𝑖=1 𝑘=1
𝜕𝑧 𝑖=1
lamination area of the preloaded laminated plates 3# is reduced by ap-
The typical distributions of interlaminar stresses for both [0/90]8 plying the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads (1000𝜇𝜀) in both the exper-
and [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plates after applying the in-plane ten- iment and the simulation.
sile preloads are shown in Fig. 8(c) and (d). Results indicate that all Fig. 9(b) and (d) also show the stiffness degradations of all the co-
the interlaminar stresses are relatively small (close to zero) at the cen- hesive elements on the preloaded [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plates
ter location of preloaded laminated plates. Furthermore, 𝜎 z decreases on which different locations are impacted. Different with the case
to the minimum at the location where is 0.75b from the center loca- of [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plate 3#, the impact location of
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al.
Fig. 9. Stiffness degradation of the laminated plates; (a) [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plate 3# before impact; (b) [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plate 3# after
impact; (c) [0/90]8 laminated plate 7# after impact; (d) [0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plate 9# after near-edge impact.
[0/90/+45/−45]2S laminated plate 9# locates at the weakening area
(near-edge region) where the initial stiffness degradations are relatively
higher than those of stiffening area (center location), thus causing the
interlaminar stresses play an important role in delamination. On the
basis of stiffness degradation around the impact location, the tolerance
of stiffness degradation in the process of impact for laminated plate 9#
is smaller than that of laminated plate 3#, which results in the reduction
of delamination resistance of laminated plate 9#. Moreover, the weak-
ening effect of interlaminar stresses on the delamination resistance is
much stronger than the strengthening effect of increased bending stiff-
ness. Therefore, the delamination area significantly increases when im-
pacting the near-edge region of preloaded laminated plate.
In general, when impacting the center location on the target plate,
the weakening effects of interlaminar stresses on delamination resis-
tance of the preloaded laminated plates are almost negligible, thus caus-
ing the increased bending stiffness becomes the dominant factor which
can influence the delamination resistance of the preloaded laminated
plates. However, when impacting the near-edge region on the target
plate, the weakening effects of interlaminar stresses on delamination
resistance are gradually enhanced, which results in a competition be-
tween the bending stiffening effect and weakening effects of interlami-
nar stresses. Such competing mechanism is considered as the reason of
different delamination area when impacting distinct locations of the tar-
get plates. It is worthy to mention that the special delamination tendency
of laminated plate 7# since its relatively large off-central distance. On
plate 7#, the stiffening effect and the weakening effect on delamination
resistance nearly cancel each other out, which results in almost the same
delamination area of preloaded plate and unloaded plate.
International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 161–162 (2019) 105012
6. Summary and conclusions
The influence of biaxial in-plane preloads on high-velocity impact
responses of laminate composite plates was investigated in this work.
Ballistic impact tests were conducted launching steel sphere against
both the preloaded and unloaded laminated plates by using a gas gun.
Specially, not only the center location but also the near-edge region
of preloaded plates was impacted. Meanwhile, numerical simulations
were performed to gain additional insight into the impact responses of
preloaded laminated plates by employing the revised Ladevèze failure
criterion in ABAQUS. The simulation results showed good agreement
with experiments. By using the LWT method combined with the simula-
tion results, the influence of biaxial in-plane preloads on the delamina-
tion resistance of laminated plate was discussed. The main conclusions
were drawn:
The delamination resistance of laminated plate can be influenced by
the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads under high-velocity impact loading.
On one hand, the applied biaxial in-plane tensile preloads can enhance
the out of plane bending stiffness of the laminated plate, thus provide
a positive effect on the delamination resistance of laminated plate. On
the other hand, the interlaminar stresses generating in the laminated
plate when applying the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads tend to result
in the weakening effect on the delamination resistance of laminated
plate when subjected to high-velocity impact loading. Therefore, the
influence of the biaxial in-plane tensile preloads on the delamination
resistance of laminated plate is considered as the competition between
the increased bending stiffness induced enhancement effect and the in-
terlaminar stresses induced weakening effect.
C. Wang, T. Suo and C. Hang et al.
Acknowledgments
This work was performed under the financial support from the
National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant Nos.11772268,
11522220, 11272267 and 11527803) and 111 Project (grant No.
B07050) of Northwestern Polytechnical University.
Supplementary materials
Supplementary material associated with this article can be found, in
the online version, at doi:10.1016/j.ijmecsci.2019.105012.
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