Damage and failure in carbon/epoxy filament wound composite tubes under external pressure: Experimental and numerical approaches

In this work, damage and failure in carbon fiber reinforced epoxy filament wound composite tubes were thoroughly evaluated through a proposed damage model, which is able to identify different failure modes. Moreover, a non-linear finite element model based on the arc length method was developed. The tubes were manufactured via dry-filament winding using T700 towpregs, and subjected to external pressure tests to evaluate computational analyses. Numerical results indicated that the tubes with a diameter-to-thickness ratio (d/t) lower than 20:1 fail by buckling, whereas the tube [90 ± 55₁₂/90], which has a higher d/t ratio presented failure primarily driven by in-plane shear, with delaminations. These results were compared with experimental tests, and relative differences in external pressure strengths were lower than 8.4%. The developed model presented a low computational cost and a very good agreement with experimental results, being very attractive to both academic and industrial sectors.