Evaluation of fiber material properties in filament-wound composite pressure vessels

Fiber material properties are the most important factors from among various material properties for the design of composite pressure vessels because of their dominant effect on the performance of composite pressure vessels. However, the fiber material properties of filament-wound pressure vessels are very sensitive to various processing variables and the size effect so that it is not possible accurately to measure fiber material properties using existing test methods. The hydro-burst test with full-scale pressure vessels is the best method to obtain fiber material properties, but it entails exorbitant costs. Consequently, the present paper proposes the hoop ring test, a newly developed test that is capable of pressure testing with ring specimens extracted from full-scale composite pressure vessels. The fiber material properties from the hoop ring test method showed good agreement with the results of the hydro-burst test with full-scale composite pressure vessels.