A BOUNDARY COLLOCATION METHOD FOR STRESS-ANALYSIS OF LAMINATE EDGES

An approach to computing the stress state near an edge of a composite laminate, such as a graphite/epoxy composite used in modern aircraft, is presented. An exponential-based family of displacement functions is derived which satisfies the internal equations of equilibrium for linear elastic materials. Linear expansions of these functions which approximately satisfy conditions at collocation points on layer boundaries and interfaces are calculated from an overdetermined system of linear equations. A thorough formulation is presented, results for a free edge problem are compared with published results, and the possible advantages of this relatively simple approach are highlighted. © 1990.