On matrix cracking and splits modeling in laminated composites

To establish a reliable virtual testing strategy for composite design, the damage mesomodel for laminated composites has been developed at LMT-Cachan since the 1980s. Nevertheless, the predictions using the mesomodel could be too conservative in particular situations such as composite structures involving extensive splitting. Indeed, the predicted splits appear thicker than the extremely thin ones experimentally observed. In this work, a split detection criterion is proposed and cohesive interfaces are introduced for representing extremely thin splits in addition to delamination interfaces. Comparisons between the classical approach and the proposed enhanced mesomodel version are presented, showing a very good accuracy of the second one with experiments.