Modeling of a realistic barely visible impact damage in composite structures based on NDT techniques and numerical simulations

In this paper, the authors presented a concept of a construction of a parametric model of barely visible impact damage (BVID) in carbon fiber-reinforced composite structures based on a reconstruction of X-ray computed tomography scans, ultrasonic B- and C-Scans as well as numerical simulations of such a type of impact loading. Considering the results of the experimental tests made it possible to model the resulting BVID with a realistic geometry and the location of delaminations, while the results of the numerical simulations allowed confirming and adjusting the damage extent. The original procedure of the BVID reconstruction from non-destructive testing data was developed and presented in the paper for the purpose of preparing the parametric computer-aided design (CAD) models. Using both numerical and experimental results the generic shapes of BVID for the set of various impact energies and various impactors were achieved. The determined dependencies of changing the damage extent with respect to various energies and impactors made it possible to parametrize BVID. The resulting generic models of BVID were validated on the X-ray computed tomography scans.

Automated summary

The authors presented a method in this paper to parametrically model the barely visible impact damage (BVID) in carbon fiber-reinforced composite structures based on X-ray computed tomography scans, ultrasonic B- and C-Scans, and numerical simulations. The resulting generic models of BVID were validated on X-ray computed tomography scans, providing a successful reconstruction and validation method for such damages.