Software for FEM Analysis of Filament Wound Tubes with ANSYS

Description

Compared with metal tubes, filament wound composite tubes have higher specific stiffness/strength and higher corrosion resistance. These advantages have led to their usage in many industrial applications. However, the analysis of the filament wound tubes is difficult due to anisotropy in material properties and inhomogeneity in microstructures. In particular, the inter-weaving of fibre tows in a typical helical winding process results in a complicate internal structure with fibre crossovers, overlaps, and undulations. These factors are critical to the damage/failure characteristics of a filament wound tube.

To address these issues, researchers at the University of Alberta have developed an ANSYS plug-in computer program for the analysis of filament wound composite tubes. ANSYS is a leading finite element analysis tool for computer-aided engineering. This plug-in enables the user to create, run, and post-process a finite element model with complex fibre architectures within the ANSYS application. It also enables the user to create a solid model through the input of winding angle, bandwidth of fibre tow, number of winding circuits, and diameter of the tube. A wide range of these process parameters of practical significance is covered in the software.

Advantages

Rapid and accurate modeling of filament wound tubular structures
Effective determination of tubular properties
Highly automated using the ANSYS Parametric Design Language (APDL)

Potential Markets

Companies in the filament winding industry as well as consulting firms and research institutions engaged in product development, design, and analysis of filament windings tubular components will be interested in this product.

Protection Status

Product Number

2006-050

Contact Information

Jayant Kumar
780.492.9806
jayant.kumar@tecedmonton.com

DISCLAIMER:

Although care has been taken in the preparation of this material to be as accurate as possible, the contents of this document are provided for information purposes only, and neither the University of Alberta nor the inventors offer any warranty, written or implied, as to the accuracy of the said contents.