Buckling of Unidirectional Composites Containing Noncircular Fibers: Part II—Nonelliptical Sections

Abstract

A simple micro-macro approach is applied to study the buckling of unidirectional composites containing a single row or multiple rows of rectangular, triangular and C-shell fibers. The fiber volume fraction and the distribution of fiber slanted angle are taken into account in this model. The concept of ratio of critical buckling stresses is utilized to study this class of problem. The result reveals that the critical buckling stresses of unidirectional composites containing noncircular fibers are affected significantly by the fiber volume fraction. The critical buckling stress of a unidirectional composite can be improved using noncircular fibers under certain conditions. The relations of critical buckling stress versus fiber slanted angle and the critical buckling stress versus laminate thickness are generally different for different fiber shapes.