Effects of weave architecture and mesoscale material properties on the macroscale mechanical response of advanced woven fabrics

This research explores the effects of mesoscale (yarn) material properties on the macroscale mechanical response of various woven fabric architectures. A unit cell finite element modeling for plain, basket, twill and satin weaves is adopted and coupled with a special design-of-experiments approach. To investigate the effects of the yarn material properties and weave architectures, two loading cases are studied: (1) Uniaxial tensile, and (2) Shear. Macroscale response outcomes such as woven fabric modulus, Poisson's ratio, frictional energy dissipation and shear resistance are defined for each loading case and the effects of the mesoscale material properties on these outcomes are studied. The method is capable of identifying significant parameters along with their relative effects and contributions to the outcomes. The results of the study revealed the importance of transverse shear modulus of the yarns. Moreover, the relative effects of the yarn material properties are determined using different weave architectures. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.