Fiber path definitions for elastically tailored conical shells

Elastic stiffness tailoring of laminated composite panels by allowing the fibers to curve within the plane of the laminae has proven to be beneficial and practical for flat rectangular plate designs. In this paper the field of application of this variable-stiffness concept is extended to three-dimensional conical shells with arbitrary dimensions that can be fabricated using advanced fiber placement machines. This paper presents the detailed derivation of four theoretical fiber path definitions for generalized conical shell surfaces. The different path definitions and resulting laminate geometries are discussed. Implementation of fabrication details and constraints in terms of the steering radius of curvature based on advanced tow-placement technology are demonstrated.