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An experimental investigation on
the low-velocity impact response
of carbonaramid/epoxy hybrid
composite laminates
Sun Ying, Tang Mengyun, Rong Zhijun, Shi Baohui and Chen Li
Abstract
In the current study, the low-velocity impact response of hybrid-laminated composites based on the twill woven fabrics
was investigated experimentally. The following five different types of carbonaramid/epoxy hybrid laminates were
produced and tested, (a) two types of interply hybrid, (b) two types of sandwich-like interply hybrid, and (c) intraply
hybrid. Non-hybrid carbon and aramid twill woven laminates were also tested for comparison. The effects of the hybrid
structure on the impact properties such as the peak load, the ductility index, and damage area were discussed. The
impact damage resistances of specimens were evaluated by comparing damage images taken from both the impacted and
the non-impacted surface. The damage and failure mechanisms were analyzed from the impact damage morphologies
using ultrasonic C-scan and three-coordinate measuring device. Under the same impact energies, the interply hybrid
laminates with carbon fabric on the impact surface have higher impact damage resistance. It can be concluded that placing
of high stiffness carbon fabric at highly stressed regions as reinforcement would result in enhanced properties, and the
damage tolerance performance of composites with interply hybrid structure are better than those of other hybrid
composites.
Keywords
Hybrid-laminated composites, aramid fiber, carbon fiber, twill woven, low-velocity impact properties
Introduction
Carbon berreinforced epoxy laminated composites
with superior specic strength and specic modulus
have become signicantly popular in recent years.
However, one of the major limitation is the low fracture
energy of carbon/epoxy composites just because both
carbon ber and epoxy are brittle. Investigations
showed that the large increase in fracture toughness
of matrix has translated very low to moderate increase
in toughness of its composites.13 Hybrid ber composites, which combine two or more types of ber
reinforcements, have been introduced to improve the
short of traditional ber reinforced polymer (FRP)
composites extensively used for highly loaded structures in many advanced engineering applications, such
as automotive, marine, and aviation industries. In addition, the properties of hybrid ber composites can be
tailored for specic applications by changing ber type,
Specimen production
The ve dierent types of carbonaramid/epoxy hybrid
laminates were produced using same RTM system. Five
hybrid congurations were included: two types of interply hybrid (IE-C: seven layers of carbon fabrics and six
layers of aramid fabrics were alternatively stacked,
keeping carbon fabrics as outer layers; IE-K: seven
Density (g/cm3)
Linear density
Tensile
strength (MPa)
Tensile
modulus (GPa)
Extension at
break (%)
T300
Kevlar49
JL-236
1.76
1.44
1.12
3K
1500D
3530
3000
81.70
230
112.40
2.81
1.50
2.40
Ying et al.
Linear density
Warp Weft
PT PW
(ends/cm)
Areal
density (kg/m2)
Thickness
(mm)
Carbon
Aramid
Carbonaramid
3K 3K
1500D 1500D
1500D 3K
6.5 6.5
6.5 6.5
6.5 6.5
0.270
0.244
0.253
0.40
0.38
0.40
Hybrid structure
Layer configuration
Diagram
SI-C
SI-K
IE-C
IE-K
SA-C
SA-K
IA-CK
Single-carbon
Single-aramid
Inter-hybrid
[C13]
[K13]
[C/K/C/K/C/K/C/K/C/K/C/K/C]
[K/C/K/C/K/C/K/C/K/C/K/C/K]
[C3/K7/C3]
[K3/C7/K3]
[C-K]13
ggggggggggggg
ggggggg
gggggg
gggggg
ggggggg
Intraply hybrid
Sandwich-like Inter-hybrid
Intra-hybrid
Hybrid structure
SI-C
SI-K
IE-C
IE-K
SA-C
SA-K
IA-CK
Single-carbon
Single-aramid
Inter-hybrid
Sandwich-like Inter-hybrid
Intra-hybrid
Nominal
thickness (mm)
Density (g/cm3)
Fiber volume
fraction (%)
Aramid fiber
ratio (%)
4.00
4.00
4.01
4.02
4.00
4.05
4.00
1.45
1.34
1.38
1.38
1.48
1.39
1.34
49.80
50.20
53.25
50.13
51.56
50.13
50.00
0
100
50
60
40
55
50
conducted by using BSN-C3409 ultrasonic C-scan testing system as shown in Figure 3(c).
Ying et al.
Figure 3. (a) Drop-weight impact test setup. (b) Three-coordinate measuring device. (c) C-scan equipment.
30
Zone I
Zone III
Zone II
25
energy (J)
20
15
SI-K
SI-C
IE-C
10
IE-K
SA-C
SA-K
IA-KC
0
0
6
time (ms)
10
12
Hybrid structure
EP/J
Ei/J
DI
SI-C
SI-K
IE-C
IE-K
SA-C
SA-K
IA-CK
Single-carbon
Single-aramid
Inter-hybrid
7.62
9.59
10.29
11.73
9.99
10.42
11.62
20.38
18.47
17.74
16.27
18.07
17.61
16.58
0.37
0.52
0.58
0.72
0.55
0.59
0.70
Sandwich-like
Inter-hybrid
Intra-hybrid
Ying et al.
Figure 7. The typical impact damage morphology photos of samples with carbon fabric on the impact surface and intraply hybrid
fabric on the impact surface. The arrow a stands for the long axis length and the arrow b stands for the short axis length.
carbonaramid ber hybrid composite has great inuence on the impact toughness.
Figure 8. The typical 3D super-depth photos of laminates with carbon fabric on the impact surface and intraply hybrid fabric on the
impact surface.
impactor because of locally high stresses and indentation eects, and on the non-impacted face due to high
bending stress. Each of damage modes is inuenced by
the staking sequences and ber properties. The interaction between damage modes inuences failure initiation and propagation. The damage modes of
specimens were evaluated for front surface (impacted
face) and back surface (non-impacted face) by visual
inspection.
Ying et al.
Hybrid
structure
Long axis
length a/mm
Short axis
length b/mm
Single-carbon
Inter-hybrid
Sandwich-like
Inter-hybrid
Intra-hybrid
32.12
83.24
70.24
22.31
38.26
19.87
31.58
19.36
Figure 9. The typical impact damage morphology photos of laminates with aramid fabric on the impact surface.
10
Figure 10. The typical 3D super-depth photos of samples with aramid fabric on the impact surface.
Hybrid structure
SI-K
IE-K
SA-K
Single-aramid
Inter-hybrid
Sandwich-like
Inter-hybrid
Intra-hybrid
IA-CK
Long axis
length a0 /mm
Short axis
length b0 /mm
0
58.22
22.04
0
22.36
18.54
31.58
19.36
Ying et al.
11
Figure 11. The C-scan results after impact of typical composite laminates with carbon fabric on the impact surface.
Hybrid structure
SI-C
SI-K
IE-C
IE-K
SA-C
SA-K
IA-CK
Single-carbon
Single-aramid
Inter-hybrid
Sandwich-like
Inter-hybrid
Intra-hybrid
Damage
area/mm2
Dent
depth/mm
457.43
799.12
831.10
1538.09
1321.08
1686.97
1821.45
1.263
0.918
0.949
1.221
0.891
0.635
1.68
Conclusions
In this study, the eect of hybrid structure on the
low-velocity impact response of hybrid laminates was
investigated experimentally. From the impact tests,
ultrasonic C-scan, and micrographic inspection, the following conclusions are reached:
1. Among the seven groups of laminates tested, the
non-hybrid carbon/epoxy laminates (SI-C) have the
highest impact peak load, while the non-hybrid
aramid/epoxy laminates (SI-K) have the lowest.
Among the ve types of carbon-aramid/epoxy
hybrid laminates, the interply hybrid laminates
12
with carbon fabric on the impact surface (IE-C) perform better than others. The impact peak load of
IE-C hybrid composite is approximately 21%
higher than that of SI-K composite and approximately 7% smaller than that of SI-C composite.
2. The DI values of carbonaramid/epoxy hybrid
laminates were higher compared with non-hybrid
ber composites, implying that, for hybrid composites, more energy will be dissipated to reach the maximum load than afterward. The interply hybrid
composite with aramid fabric on the impact surface
(IE-K) has the highest DI value, which shows the
best impact fracture toughness.
3. The average damage areas of laminates with carbon
fabric on the impact surface are smaller than those
of laminates with aramid fabric on the impact surface under the same hybrid structure (damage area:
SI-C < SI-K, IE-C < IE-K, SA-C < SA-K). And,
interply hybrid structure is superior to other
hybr structures (damage area: IE-C < SA-C, IEK < SA-K).
As for the future studies, optimizing and developing
hybrid laminates with dierent fabric structures are
promising to be exploited for novel lightweight materials for automobile.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following nancial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: This work was supported by the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (Grant Numbers 11102133)
and the Science and Technology Research Project of
Chinese Ministry of Education (Grant Number 211007).
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