Composite interlaminar damage analysis based on cohesive element

A new type of zero-thickness cohesive element model was proposed to study the composite interlaminar damage, which could accurately predict the delamination propagation of mode I. The model consisted of the constitutive relationship, damage criterion and damage evolvement. This cohesive model was implemented in the explicit integration scheme with the commercial finite element software ABAQUS using the user subroutine VUEL, which allowed the use of coarse meshes and did not exist the convergence problem. Finally, the model was used to predict the progress of delamination in the double cantilever beam test (DCB) of domestic carbon fiber/resin the composite (CCF300/5428). The result shows that this cohesive element is effective to analysis the delamination in the composite laminates.