Analytic model for investigation of effect of temperature change on residual stress and curvature of symmetric and un-symmetric composite laminates

Curing process of composites results in the formation of residual stress and distortion. According to costs of composites fabrication, simulation of the fabrication process in order to avoid wasting investment is important. A common and simple method of composite fabrication is hand lay-up. In this research plane stress due to temperature change of composite laminates has been investigated and its resultant curvature has been analyzed. So, two symmetric and un-symmetric laminates with eight plies are subjected to 100-degree centigrade temperature change and normal and shear stresses have been calculated. First, by classical lamination theory which is the most important theory in stress analysis of composites, mechanical properties of glass/epoxy composite with 70 percent volume fraction, temperature change and stacking sequence are input variables of the written program. Three in-plane stress component is read and the amount of curvature has achieved that shows it is negligible for the symmetric sample. To validate the residual stress field, finite element simulation for both samples has been done that resulted in finding the same results with negligible errors. Assumptions are considered in finite element modeling and classical lamination theory which result in deviation of outputs from reality. In spite of these assumptions, the thermal simulation of composite laminations in ABAQUS software can have the desired prediction of reality. The innovation of the research is the use of this software and the verification of code.