Composite Stress Toolbox

Introduction

Composite stress toolbox functionality is provided in the right-click context menu for relevant entities. Engineering constants and relevant material/laminate matrices can be calculated for:

• Materials
• Plies
• Zones
• Laminates

Figure 1.

Engineering Constants

Calculations are output in the laminate’s material reference orientation. Accordingly, the ply angle entered in the ply Orientation field is used to transform the properties from ply fiber direction to the laminate material reference orientation. For more information, refer to Fiber Orientation.

Note that 3D properties can only be calculated for plies which have an assigned material which provides the necessary data (for example, OptiStruct MAT9OR).

Figure 2.

If all plies of a laminate have an assigned shape, the analysis is provided for all zones of the selected laminate. If one or more plies in a Laminate do not have a Ply Shape assigned, no Laminate Zones are generated. Accordingly, laminate calculations are provided for the full stacking sequence as defined in the laminate.

Figure 3.

Additionally, stacking sequence, thickness and number of layers are summarized for each zone.

Solver Specific Details

Entities created in the Composite Browser are assigned the most common solver card for a typical ply-based model. Properties and Shapes are filtered based on solver card to only display appropriate cards for a ply-based model. Additionally, in the OptiStruct profile, the appropriate card is set for laminate and ply entities upon creation.