Three-dimensional phase field modeling of progressive failure in aramid short fiber reinforced paper

As a kind of synthetic aromatic polyamide, aramid fiber has many outstanding properties, such as high strength, high modulus, etc. The composited paper reinforced by aramid fiber is widely used in honeycombs and its strength is of great concerns. In this paper, a three-dimensional progressive failure phase field model is employed to investigate the failure mechanism of aramid honeycomb paper under microscopic length scale. A mesh mapping technique is used to handle the complex geometry of the material, and an explicit solving scheme is used to improve the solving efficiency. The theory is implemented into ABAQUS through the users’ subroutine VUEL. The interfacial debounding and matrix cracking in the short fiber reinforced composite are captured successfully, and the complicated failure mechanism is explored from the modeling results. The present phase field modeling technique has provided a useful numerical tool for the strength prediction of aramid short fiber reinforced composites.