VIRTUAL TENSILE TESTING OF ADDITIVELY MANUFACTURED SHORT FIBER COMPOSITE WITH STOCHASTIC MORPHOLOGY.

Additive manufacturing (AM) has enabled representative models and structures to be produce in a time-efficient manner relative to conventional subtractive manufacturing methods. In general, there has been wide-spread observation of fiber reinforced polymers improving the overall mechanical property of a part relative to the bulk resin or printed polymer. The strength and stiffness increases with fiber length; however, both stiffness and strength can be also greatly influenced by the type of AM process by which ultimately defines the microstructure of the material. While the stiffness and strength may be readily obtained by performing standardized mechanical tests, the influence of the microstructure given multiple-phases in an additively manufactured material is not generally well-understood or reported. A collection of microstructural information for a multi-phase composite consisting of discontinuous and matrix has been used for virtual characterization of the effective tensile properties by progressive failure analysis (PFA) in a representative volume element (RVE) in a stochastic fashion. Extended Finite Element Method (XFEM) combined with cohesive zone modeling was used to investigate the competing microscopic failure mechanism responsible for macroscopic mechanical properties of an AM composite. The development of comprehensive computational model will further inform the additive manufacturing process of AM materials to improve both the process and mechanical strength of the material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]