Analysis of process-induced damage in remote laser cut carbon fibre reinforced polymers

TL;DR

This paper introduces a method linking process-induced damage to fracture behavior in carbon fibre reinforced polymers, using models to compare thermal damage effects from laser cutting and milling.

Contribution

It presents a novel approach to model and quantify thermally induced damage effects in CFRP caused by laser cutting, connecting damage to fracture behavior.

Findings

Laser cut specimens show different damage profiles compared to milled ones.

Thermal damage significantly affects fracture strength and behavior.

The model accurately predicts damage zones based on heat conduction.

Abstract

In this contribution a method is introduced that allows for a linkage between the process-induced structural damage and the fracture behaviour. Based on an anisotropic elastic material model, different modelling approaches for initial damage effects are introduced and compared. The approaches are applied to remote laser cut carbon fibre reinforced polymers in order to model various thermally induced damage effects like chemical decomposition, micro-cracks and delamination. The dimensions of this heat affected zone are calculated with 1D-heat conduction. In experiment and simulation milled and laser cut specimens with different process parameters are compared in order to quantify the impact of the cutting technology on the fracture behaviour. For this purpose open hole specimens were used.