Tensile Behavior and Damage/Acoustic Emission Characteristics of Woven Glass Fiber Reinforced/Epoxy Composite Laminates at Cryogenic Temperatures.

This paper examines the tensile properties and damage behavior of glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) laminates at cryogenic temperatures. Cryogenic tensile tests were conducted on three types of woven-fabric laminate specimens, and information about the damage initiation and progression was provided by acoustic emission (AE) technique. A finite element model was also developed for progressive failure analyses of the three tensile test specimens, and applied to simulate the damage behavior in each specimen. A comparison was made between simulation and experiment. © 2006 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]