Geometric modelling of textiles for prediction of composite processing and performance characteristics

A geometric textile modelling package (modeller) is being developed, which forms the basis for a number of software tools predicting the processing properties of textile reinforcements and the final properties of composite parts. The modeller can provide interlacing patterns representing any textile reinforcement in a simple, universal format. In this paper the general concept of the modeller is presented and examples are provided for woven textiles and noncrimp textiles assembled by a warp knitted stitch. The modeller and the predictive tools are modular. The main advantage of this is that tools for the prediction ofthe reinforcement properties can accept any geometricdefinition, regardless of the textile type, provided that the definitions and models are expressed in the required format. The tools also have the capacity to assess properties such as permeability or behaviour in compaction and shear, for preforms containing textiles of different types.