Mechanical behaviour of composite materials made by resin film infusion

Tensile and compression tests are a part of the qualification process for composite parts in aircraft structures. With each new material, a new set of tests is required. To reduce costs, it is advantageous to develop analysis tools for the prediction of damages and failure in such tests, so that the amount of testing can be reduced and predictions about material behavior can be made early in the design process. In this paper, an experimental and numerical study is presented on the tensile and compression strength of composite material developed by Alenia Aeronautica for aerospace applications and produced by means of the resin film infusion (RFI) and stitching process. Tensile and compression tests have been performed on specimens with three different lay-ups: 33/33/33, 40/40/20 and 100/0/0. They refer to the percentage of oriented fibres for each layer along three directions (0°/±45°/90°). The data observed are being used to develop a method for predicting the tensile and compression strength, and the numerical results are compared with the experimental ones.