Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

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Materials Today Communications

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/mtcomm

Effects of carbon nanotubes on open-hole carbon fiber reinforced polymer T

composites
Kang-ning Hana,b, Wei Zhoua,b,*, Reng Qina,b, Guang-fei Wanga,b, Lian-Hua Maa,b,*
a
School of Quality and Technical Supervision, Hebei University, Baoding 071002, China
b
National&Local Joint Engineering Research Center of Metrology Instrument and System, Hebei University, Baoding 071002, China

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Properties and damage evolution of open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced composite laminates without/with
fiber-reinforced polymers MWCNTs during tensile damage were monitored by a complementary technology combining acoustic emission,
carbon nanotubes digital image correlation and finite elements analysis. Meanwhile, the AE signals can be post-processed by fuzzy
AE C-Means. It was concluded that adding amount of MWCNTs can reduce the stress concentration, improve the
DIC
strength and fracture interface stiffness of laminate specimens and prevent the evolution of micro-cracks. The AE
finite elements analysis
signals are concentrated in three areas: 23-74 kHz (matrix cracking), 82-120 kHz (fiber pull-out and delami-
nation), 120-190 kHz (fiber breakage), respectively. An enhancement of properties of materials is obtained
correspondingly due to the addition of MWCNTs into matrix. The number and amplitude of AE signals corre-
sponding to matrix cracking produced by the specimen without MWCNTs are much larger than that of the
specimen with MWCNTs, indicating that the damage degree of matrix cracking for the specimen without
MWCNTs is more serious. The properties and damage evolution of composites can be studied from experimental
research and numerical simulation, respectively.

1. Introduction
Fiber-reinforced polymers (FRPs) have great application prospect in
aerospace and other industries due to their many outstanding proper-
ties such as high specific strength and modulus properties [1]. How-
ever, due to anisotropy of composite laminate specimens, the obtained
parts still suffer from much damage, which makes the situation of
specimens becomes more complex during their service life. CNTs have
been served as ideal filler which can be combined with micrometer-
scale fibers due to their distinctive mechanical properties [2–4]. Hence,
combining with nanocomposites such as carbon nanotubes (CNTs) is
important to extend their application. Recently, the investigations on
the impact of the CNTs reinforcement in polymeric composites have
been carried out extensively. Kumar et al. [5] studied the effect of
multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) on open-hole glass/epoxy
reinforced polymer composites. They indicated that the quality of hole
was enhanced observably owing to the addition of MWCNTs in re-
inforced polymer composites. Similarly, Kim et al. [6] added the CNTs
into FRPs and tried to enhance crack resistance of carbon fiber re-
inforced polymer composites. They founded that the composites with
functionalized-CNTs can enhance the interlaminar fracture toughness
and transverse crack resistance.
Acoustic emission (AE) detecting technology can monitor the da-
mage of composite laminates in-situ and on-line during tensile damage
[7–9]. Huang et al. [10] adopted AE technology to identify the failure
modes of various ply thickness open-hole laminate specimens during
tensile tests. It was found that the initial damage stress was larger, the
maximum strength was lower in the thin-ply laminate specimens. Ob-
tained results of AE analysis indicated that the thin-ply laminates have
outstanding ability to inhibit damage and crack growth, which lead to
higher initial damage stress and quasi-brittle fracture characteristics.
Azadi et al. [11] investigated the function of loading rate on damage
evolution of open-hole polymeric composites during tensile tests. They
adopted fuzzy C-Means (FCM) and wavelet packet transform (WPT) to
analyze the AE signals. It was demonstrated that the stress tend to in-
crease while the strain tend to decrease with the increase of tensile
loading rate. Furthermore, the range of frequency for matrix cracking,
fiber breakage and fibers/matrix debonding according to the FCM was
100-250 kHz, 420-500 kHz and 250-420 kHz, respectively. Similarly,
Stuckey et al. [12] adopted a novel combination method including situ
electrical resistance and AE to investigate the onset of damage in
composites (CNTs embedded in epoxy) under quasi-static tensile
loading conditions. The results indicated that the AE counts had less
number at the initial stage of tensile loading and after the specimen

⁎
Corresponding authors at: School of Quality and Technical Supervision, Hebei University, Baoding 071002, China.
E-mail addresses: zhouweihy@126.com, zhouwei@hbu.edu.cn (W. Zhou), lhma@hbu.edu.cn (L.-H. Ma).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mtcomm.2020.101106
Received 23 March 2020; Accepted 28 March 2020
Available online 08 April 2020
2352-4928/ © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
K.-n. Han, et al. Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

Fig. 1. Hand lay-up procedure of specimens contained 0.5 wt% MWCNTs.

Fig. 2. Composite architectures. (a) without MWCNTs, and (b) with MWCNTs of 0.5 wt%.

reached the peak tensile stress, the AE count increased due to the
generation of micro-cracks.
Digital image correlation (DIC) method is an efficient testing tech-
nology which can obtain the variation trend of displacement fields or
strain fields by the change of speckle on the surface of composite spe-
cimens [13,14]. Hao et al. [15] utilized principal component analysis
(PCA) to reduce the impact of noise on DIC measurement system. At the
same time, they developed speckle image simulation at high tempera-
ture to explore the noise influences on the DIC method and analyzed the
influence of noise on PCA through displacement fields under several
special conditions obtained from simulated and experimental images,
respectively. Nag-Chowdhury et al. [16] utilized AE, DIC and em-
bedded quantum resistive strain sensors (sQRS) complementary mon-
itoring technique to monitor the failure of composites. They determined
the strain profile near the defects of percolated CNTs network based on
sQRS by DIC. It was found that anticipating the complete failure and
locating stress or strain singularities can ensure the availability of sQRS
application in composite structure health monitoring.
Finite element method can be used to accurate solution of complex
engineering problems as a numerical method [17,18]. Tarfaoui et al.
[19] investigated damage evolution of open-hole fiber-reinforced la-
minate specimens containing CNTs during tensile loading. They utilized

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K.-n. Han, et al. Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

Fig. 3. The shape and dimension of specimens.

Table 1 2. Experimentation
Mechanical properties of each constituent.
Constituents E11(GPa) E22(GPa) ν G12(GPa) G13=G23(GPa)
2.1. Materials and Composites Manufacturing

Carbon fiber 230 15.41 0.46 10.04 5.29
Epoxy matrix 3 0.32 1.14
MWCNTs 450 0.26
experimental characterization and numerical homogenizations to ob-
tain the orthotropic properties. At the same time, they performed the
numerical study and the results obtained indicated that the force-dis-
placement curves were consistent with the experimental results. Simi-
larly, El Moumen et al. [20] determined the mechanical properties of
MWCNTs reinforced polymers by instrumented indentation testing.
They utilized finite element analysis models to simulate micro-in-
dentation test and confronted to experimental test. It was demonstrated
that the addition of CNTs to the matrix can improve the stiffness of
fracture interface and mechanical properties of CNTs reinforced poly-
mers, and prevent micro-cracks evolution.
In this research, AE, DIC and finite elements analysis com-
plementary technologies were used to investigate the failure process of
open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced laminates. Besides, FCM was utilized
to analyze AE signals of composite specimens. To date, many studies on
fiber-reinforced composites have been investigated. However, there are
few researches on the open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced composite la-
minates with CNTs. It should be mentioned that the novelty of the study
is the investigation of the open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced composite
laminates without/with CNTs from experimental research and numer-
ical simulation.
Two types of fiber-reinforced laminate specimens manufactured by
hand lay-up method were prepared with 14 layers of plain-weave
carbon fiber (T300-3k) [5]. The manufacturing process of Specimen B
shows in Fig. 1. MWCNTs with weight percentages of 0.5 wt% were
added to acetone and sonicated for 60 min at 40 ℃ which can minimize
the opportunities for aggregation. The frequency of ultrasonic is 40
kHz. Then, epoxy was added to the mixed liquid and sonicated for 10 h
at 80 ℃ to remove the acetone. The ratio between the epoxy resin and
the curing agent was 10:4. When the MWCNTs-epoxy cool down at
room temperature, hardener was added and stirred for 10 min. Epoxy
resin was brushed to each layer of fiber by hand lay-up technique and
then material was pressurized in mold by vacuum assisted resin infu-
sion method for 48 h. Final laminates were prepared and the average
thickness is 3.1 ± 0.1 mm. Specimen A (have no MWCNTs) was also
manufactured by hand lay-up technology to ensure the same process as
Specimen B (have 0.5 wt% MWCNTs). The architecture of composite
laminates is shown in Fig. 2.
After roasting for 8 h at 100 ℃ and falling to the room temperature,
the laminates were cut into standard specimens with the size of 250 mm
× 36 mm according to ASTM D5766-2002. A circular open hole with a
diameter of 6 ± 0.1 mm was created in the center of composite lami-
nates. Two types of specimens have been prepared. Specimen A and B
represent the composite without MWCNTs and with MWCNTs of 0.5 wt
%, respectively. Fig. 3 shows the dimension of the composite laminates.
Aluminum strengthen sheets with the size of 50 mm × 36 mm were
pasted on sides of the specimens to eliminate mechanical noise. White
and black paints were sprayed on the middle of the composite laminates
about 100 mm randomly to obtain the deformation fields. There were

Fig. 4. Morphology of MWCNTs. (a) SEM morphology of MWCNTs in epoxy and (b) morphology features of MWCNTs.

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K.-n. Han, et al. Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

Fig. 5. Experimental equipment of tensile testing.

Table 2 min. AE instrument (DS2-8A) and CMOS camera (MER-500-14U3M)

Mechanical properties of composite laminates. can be used to capture the AE signals and corresponding deformation
Specimen Failure load (kN) Average Standard Tensile
during the process of tensile tests. Two wide-band AE sensors which can
type Value(kN) deviation(kN) Strength obtain the AE signals were installed on laminate specimens being 100
1 2 3 (MPa) mm apart. The frequency range of sensors is 100-900 kHz and the built-
4 in preamplifier is 5 mV. Threshold of AE signals was 40 dB and sam-
pling frequency was 3 MHz. According to ASTM-W976, a pencil lead
Specimen A 48.48 48.21 47.20 47.96 0.67 515.70
Specimen B 49.76 50.22 49.39 49.79 0.42 535.38 break test was performed before tensile tests of each specimen. Silicone
grease and tape were used to fix the sensors on the surface of laminates
and allow for better sound coupling. The speckle zones were captured
three specimens in each class of composite materials. by CMOS camera which placed 1.2 m in front of the laminate speci-
MWCNTs (purity > 95 wt%) were distributed in epoxy matrix ran- mens. The images were collected twice every second and scanned at 21
domly and the average diameter and length of nanotubes were about 10 pixels/mm. The microscopic damage mechanisms of laminate speci-
nm and 7 mm, respectively. The mechanical properties of each con- mens can be observed by SEM (JSM-7500 F) which coated by gold
stituent are listed in Table 1. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) before observation.
morphology of CNTs in epoxy is shown in Fig. 4 (a) and morphology
features of CNTs are shown in Fig. 4 (b). The nanotubes are considered
3. Results and discussion
as long curved cylindrical fibers due to the tube-shaped. The nanotubes
tend to create the agglomerations under the action of Van der Waals
3.1. Mechanical characterization
forces [20].

Through the tensile tests of the open-hole fiber-reinforced laminate

2.2. Tensile testing
Experimental equipment of tensile testing is shown in Fig. 5. Ac-
cording to the ASTM D 5766 standard, the tensile tests of open-hole
fiber-reinforced composite laminates were carried out by the universal
testing machine (LD26). The constant rate in tensile tests was 2 mm/
specimens, the mechanical properties are obtained and the experi-
mental results are reported in Table 2. As shown in Table 2, the average
failure loads of Specimen A and B are 47.96 and 49.79 kN and the
standard deviations of failure load are 0.67 and 0.42 kN, respectively.
The average tensile strengths are 515.70 and 535.38 MPa, respectively.
The laminate specimens with 0.5 wt% MWCNTs have higher failure

Fig. 6. Tensile test results for two types of laminate specimens. (a) stress vs. strain, and (b) average failure loads.

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K.-n. Han, et al. Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

Fig. 7. Load and amplitude with time of laminate specimens during the process of tensile damage evolution.

Fig. 8. Energy and cumulative hits with time of laminate specimens during the process of tensile test.

loads and tensile strengths which are attributed to the existence of the
MWCNTs [12].
The open-hole fiber-reinforced composite laminates show quasi-
brittle fracture pattern during tensile tests [11]. The tensile stress-strain
curves and the size of average failure loads for the two types of laminate
specimens are showed in Fig. 6 (a) and (b), respectively. It can be seen
that the stress-strain curves of two types of laminate specimens have
similar linear relationships and the curves increase linearly as the
tensile load increases. However, the strength and stiffness have in-
creased through the addition of CNTs. The laminate specimens with 0.5
wt% MWCNTs have higher force which indicates that MWCNTs play a
role of reinforcement [21]. Because MWCNTs are initially embedded in
the matrix, there is no effect of MWCNTs on fiber damage while the
anti-damage ability of matrix is enhanced under tensile load [19]. The

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Fig. 9. Davies-Bouldin value and Silhouette index value are used to select the optimal cluster number.

Table 3
The range of results of clustering and the number.
Specimen A Specimen B

Amplitude(dB) Frequency(kHz) Number Amplitude(dB) Frequency(kHz) Number

Cluster1 40.3∼89.6 23.4∼73.2 373 40.3∼84.7 23.4∼70.3 110
Cluster2 40.3∼68.8 82.0∼117.2 114 40.3∼70.1 82.0∼117.2 132
Cluster3 40.3∼88.5 128.9∼187.5 562 40.3∼94.8 126.0∼187.5 702

Fig. 10. Number and amplitude distribution with frequency of composite specimens.

results indicate that the properties of open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced
composite laminate specimens can be enhanced by adding appropriate
MWCNTs.
3.2. Characterization of AE Signals
The signals obtained during tensile test can be utilized to char-
acterize the damage evolution of the open-hole fiber-reinforced com-
posite laminates. Fig. 7 shows the load and amplitude with time of the
three laminate specimens during the process of tensile damage evolu-
tion. As shown in Fig. 7, two stages during the process have been di-
vided. Ⅰ) Damage accumulation stage. The amplitude of AE signals is
relatively low and the number is relatively small in this stage. Ⅱ) Da-
mage stage. The AE signals larger than 80 dB are generated con-
tinuously and the number of AE signals increases sharply. This phe-
nomenon may be caused by massive release of energy and indicates that
the laminate specimens are breaking soon [14]. Many similarities in AE
signals distribution of composite laminate specimens, but there are also
many differences according to the Fig. 7. Specimen B shown in Fig. 7
has larger load and amplitude when the specimen is destroyed. For
Specimen A, the number of signals is larger than that of Specimen B
during the damage accumulation stage and a slight sound is heard in
the same time which is mostly attributed to the damage of matrix.
Specimen B does not show this phenomenon in the damage accumu-
lation stage and the signals are mainly concentrated in the damage
stage indicating that the intensity was enhanced by adding MWCNTs to
the epoxy resin [19].
Fig. 8 shows the energy and cumulative hits with time of typical
laminate specimens during the process of testing. For Specimen A, a
series of high energy signals are generated at damage accumulation
stage and the increasing speed of cumulative hits is accelerated. At the
same time, a cluster of signals with high-amplitude are generated as
shown in Fig. 7 (a). This result further verifies the correctness of the
previous conclusion about the effect of the influence of MWCNTs on the
matrix. When the specimens are about to be destroyed, a large amount
of energy is released and the cumulative hits increases sharply. The
energy release of Specimen B is relatively concentrated and the energy
is greater than that of Specimen A when the specimens are about to be
destroyed. This phenomenon may be attributed to the reinforcement
effect of MWCNTs [21]. The AE parameters can be utilized to analyze
the damage of the open-hole fiber-reinforced composite laminates and
the cluster analysis can be used to analyze AE signals more

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Fig. 11. The SEM images. Specimen A shown in (a) and Specimen B shown in (b).

Fig. 12. The distributions of strain fields for laminate composites from 300 to 305 MPa.

comprehensively.
3.3. Analyses of AE signals with FCM
The signals of the open-hole fiber-reinforced composite laminates
obtained during the process of tensile loading are corresponded to
various damage modes. It is important to correlate signals with various
damage patterns [10,19]. The fuzzy-c means (FCM) which based on
Matlab is used to analyze signals during the process of tensile test. Non-
selective use of AE characteristics may degrade clustering quality and
lead to the generation of redundant information in the process of pat-
tern recognition. After the correlation analysis, three AE feature para-
meters including peak amplitude (PA), peak frequency (PF) and RA
value (rise time divided by peak amplitude) are selected to determine
optimal clustering number of AE signals [14]. Fig. 9 shows the results of
typical laminate specimens using Davies-Bouldin and Silhouette index.
Optimal cluster number has highest Silhouette index and lowest Davies-
Bouldin index [22]. The optimal cluster number of Specimen A is three
as shown in Fig. 9 (a). The optimal cluster number of Specimen B is
weak but the Silhouette index also has higher values. Therefore, the
optimal cluster number of open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced composite
laminate specimens is three.
For cluster analysis, PF and PA are very important characteristic
parameters [14,23,24]. Table 3 shows the number and the range of
results of clustering. Fig. 10 shows the number and amplitude dis-
tribution with frequency of typical laminates. The frequency is an ef-
fective parameters and the range of frequency can represent a specific
damage mechanism [24]. The signals of open-hole fiber-reinforced

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K.-n. Han, et al. Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

Fig. 13. The distributions of strain fields for laminate composites from 510 to 515 MPa.

Table 4 generated continuously and the AE number of Specimen B is more than

Homogenized orthotropic elastic properties of laminate specimens. that of Specimen A. This phenomenon indicates that the tensile strength
E1(GPa) E2(GPa) ν G12(GPa) G13(GPa) G23(GPa)
of Specimen B increases which further verifies the correctness of the
previous conclusion shown in Figs. 7 and 8.
Specimen A 139200 7799 0.307 3194 2560 2560
Specimen B 150972 21450 0.350 10514 7254 7254
3.4. SEM images

Fig. 11 shows the SEM images of the open-hole fiber-reinforced

Table 5
Orthotropic damage initiation properties of laminate specimens. composite laminate specimens. Fig. 11 (a) shows the SEM images of
Specimen A and the Fig. 11 (b) shows the SEM images of Specimen B,
XT(MPa) XC(MPa) YT(MPa) YC(MPa) ST(MPa) SC(MPa)
respectively. The main damage mechanisms of laminates are consistent
2490 1500 700 800 100 100 with the results of FCM and the main damage modes include matrix
cracking, fiber pull out, delamination and fiber fracture. Matrix cracks
firstly developed near the open-hole and interlaminar damage can be
Table 6 observed near the region of matrix crack [19]. Meanwhile, fiber frac-
Fracture energies of laminate specimens. ture and debonding phenomena at the interface between fiber and
GFt(KJ/m2) GFc(KJ/m2) GMt(KJ/m2) GMc(KJ/m2)
matrix can be observed and in some cases, the total delamination and
fracture of laminates may be observed. Local delamination may in-
100 100 5 5 troduce additional shear and deformation which can make the fiber
more prone to breakage [25]. Fiber breakage may lead to the cata-
strophic failure which is related to the macroscopic damage.

3.5. Analyzed deformation fields

The deformation fields of the open-hole fiber-reinforced composite

Fig. 14. Mesh retained for the study of tensile test.
composite laminates are concentrated in three areas: Cluster 1 (matrix
cracking); Cluster 2 (fiber pull-out; delamination); Cluster 3 (fiber
breakage). The frequency range of three clusters is 23-74 kHz, 82-120
kHz and 120-190 kHz, respectively. The number and amplitude of AE
signals about matrix cracking produced by Specimen A are much larger
than that of Specimen B, indicating that the damage of Specimen A in
matrix cracking is more serious. Because the MWCNTs are embedded
into matrix, the strength of the matrix is enhanced correspondingly
[19]. In the stage of fiber breakage, AE signals more than 70 dB are
laminate specimens under tensile load can be displayed by DIC method.
The selected position is the approximate square area around the hole,
and its aspect ratio is 1.095. When the strength of laminate composites
increases from 300 to 305 MPa, the distribution of strain field is shown
in Fig. 12. The maximum strain values of Specimen A and Specimen B
are 1.04% and 0.10%, respectively. For Specimen B, the strain field
increment is relatively small under the same stress increment and the
stress concentration around the round hole can be observed. This
phenomenon indicates that adding a certain amount of MWCNTs can
enhance the strength of laminates which is consistent with the results
shown in Fig. 6. During this period, the damage accumulation of Spe-
cimen A is more severe than that of Specimen B. Thus the number of AE
signals and cumulative hits of Specimen A obtained during this period
are more than that of Specimen B which is consistent with the phe-
nomenon shown in Figs. 7 and 8.
When the strength of laminate composites increases from 510 to 515
MPa, the distribution of strain field is shown in Fig. 13. During this
period, the tensile load of Specimen A reaches the maximum and there
is a marked concentration around the hole indicating the failure of
specimen is about to occur. The strain field concentration of Specimen
A is significant with obvious changes compared with Specimen B. AE
signals increase sharply and the high-amplitude AE signals are gener-
ated continuously. The rising rate of energy and cumulative number is

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K.-n. Han, et al. Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106

Fig. 15. Confrontation of numerical result and experimental date.

Fig. 16. Finite element models of Specimen A and B.

accelerated, as shown in Figs. 7 and 8. The distribution and change of mechanics and stress or strain failure criteria, the damage modeling in
the strain field can be understand and the structural health monitoring CFRP laminates can be investigated. Four failure criteria for composites
of the open-hole fiber-reinforced composite laminate specimens under (fiber damage in tension and compression and matrix tensile and
tensile load can be provided through the information obtained by DIC compressive failure) have been proposed by Hashin's [29,30]. The form
method. of Hashin's failure criterion is as follows:
Fiber tensile failure (σ̂11 ≥ 0 )
2 2
3.6. Finite element method σˆ τˆ
Ftf = ⎛ 11T ⎞ + α ⎛ 12L ⎞
⎝X ⎠ ⎝S ⎠ (1)
As a numerical technology, finite element method can be utilized to Fiber compressive failure (σ̂11 〈0 )
convert the physical structure to a complex system of points called
nodes for approximate solutions [26–28]. The behavior of open-hole σˆ 2 τˆ 2
Ftf = ⎛ 11T ⎞ + α ⎛ 12L ⎞
fiber-reinforced composite laminate specimens during the process of X
⎝ ⎠ S
⎝ ⎠ (2)
tensile tests can be predicted. To obtain the effective elastic properties,
the experimental characterization and numerical homogenizations are Matrix tensile failure (σ̂22 ≥ 0 )
utilized as input data to investigate the damage evolution in open-hole σˆ 2
τˆ 2
carbon fiber-reinforced composite laminate specimens [19–21]. The Ftm = ⎛ 22T ⎞ + α ⎛ 12L ⎞
⎝Y ⎠ ⎝S ⎠ (3)
material properties of Specimen A and B are determined theoretically
and results are given in Table 4 [26]. Following the concept of damage Matrix compressive failure (σ̂22 〈0 )

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K.-n. Han, et al.
Fig. 17. The damage of fiber and matrix with Hashin's criteria of Specimen A and B.
2 C 2 2
σˆ ⎛ Y ⎞ − 1⎤ σˆ22 + ⎛ τˆ12 ⎞
FCm = ⎛ 22T ⎞ + ⎡
⎢ 2S
⎜
T
⎟
⎥Y C L
⎝ 2S ⎠ ⎣⎝ ⎠ ⎦ ⎝S ⎠ (4)
XT and XC express the tensile and compressive strengths in fiber
direction, respectively. YT and YC express the tensile and compressive
strengths in transverse direction, respectively. SL and ST express the
longitudinal and transverse shear strengths, respectively.
Hashin's criterion is utilized to estimate damage initiation and me-
chanical behavior of composites. For numerical computations, Tables 5
and 6 show the orthotropic damage initiation properties and fracture
energies of specimens, respectively [31,32].
A model is built and 2D shell mesh is generated for performing the
tensile analysis. Laminate plate is meshed by 2 mm × 2 mm.
Furthermore, the elements around the hole are further refined (the
minimum is 0.4 mm) due to the stress concentration and damage in-
itiation in this site as shown in Fig. 14. The composite laminates are
built by the program and the properties are assigned to the laminates.
Boundary conditions are set at the ends of laminate with fixed support
at the left and corresponding displacement at the right end. The cor-
responding longitudinal displacement of Specimen A and B is 4.55 and
4.3 mm, respectively.
The load versus displacement curves obtained numerically for
Specimen A and B are shown in Fig. 15. The numerical results of the
composite laminate specimens have a good agreement with the ex-
perimental results. The composite laminates without MWCNTs exhibit
lower ultimate tensile load than the composite laminate specimens with
0.5% MWCNTs. The tensile rigidity of laminate specimen increases as
MWCNTs being added into laminate specimens as shown in Fig. 6. The
curve of load-displacement predicted by present numerical constitutive
model can be an effective tool for damage modeling [19].
Fig. 16 illustrates a map of the stress concentration for Specimen A
and B. The stress in the laminates shows heterogeneous distribution. In
this period, the stress is concentrated near the hole, which can be
considered as the location of damage and crack initiation.The dis-
tributions of strain fields is concentrated near the hole until cata-
strophic failure occurred as shown in Fig. 13. At the same time, AE
signals increase sharply and the high-amplitude AE signals are gener-
ated continuously. The rising rate of energy and cumulative number is
accelerated, as shown in Figs. 7 and 8. For open-hole laminate com-
posite materials, the damage starts from the tip of the zone of open-hole
and propagates along the direction perpendicular to tensile loading
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Materials Today Communications 24 (2020) 101106
[19]. It can be seen from Fig. 16 that the maximum stress of Specimen A
is larger than that of Specimen B. This phenomenon indicates that the
stress concentration of Specimen A is more obvious. The MWCNTs af-
fect the initiation of damage and the delamination. The quality of hole
is enhanced observably owing to the addition of the MWCNTs in re-
inforced polymer composites [5,21]. It is likely attributed to the effect
of the addition of MWCNTs to the matrix of Specimen B which further
validates the correctness of conclusion mentioned above [21]. It is
concluded that adding amount of MWCNTs can reduce the stress con-
centration, improve the strength and fracture interface stiffness of la-
minate specimens and prevent the evolution of micro-cracks.
The damage of fiber matrix for Specimen A and B are shown in
Fig. 17. It shows that the fiber damage initiates at the tip of notched
zone. At the same time, the fiber damage propagates perpendicular to
the loading direction with the increase of tensile loading. The damage
of matrix begins to enter the internal notch, and then propagates
throughout laminate interface. CNTs have no significant effect on fiber
tension failure because CNTs are initially embedded into the matrix
which is strengthened correspondingly. Hence, CNTs tend to enhance
the fracture toughness and retard the damage propagation of laminates
through increasing their tensile failure capacity. The complementary
technology combining AE, DIC and finite elements analysis can monitor
the damage evolution of open-hole fiber-reinforced composite lami-
nates and provide basis for its structural health monitoring.
4. Summary
The damage evolution of open-hole fiber-reinforced composite la-
minates under tensile loading can be studied by AE, DIC and finite
elements analysis complementary technology. The conclusions are
summarized as follows:
1 The open-hole fiber-reinforced composite laminates show quasi-
brittle fracture pattern during tensile tests. The strength and stiffness
have been increased by the addition of CNTs. The anti-damage
ability of matrix is enhanced under tensile load because MWCNTs
are initially embedded into the matrix. The results indicate that the
properties of open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced composite laminate
specimens can be enhanced by adding appropriate MWCNTs.
2 The AE signals of open-hole carbon fiber-reinforced composite la-
minate specimens are concentrated in three areas: Cluster 1 (matrix
K.-n. Han, et al.
cracking); Cluster 2 (fiber pull-out; delamination); Cluster 3 (fiber
breakage). The frequency range of three clusters is 23-74 kHz, 82-
120 kHz and 120-190 kHz, respectively. An enhancement is ob-
tained correspondingly because the MWCNTs are embedded into
matrix. The number and amplitude of AE signals about matrix
cracking produced by Specimen A are much larger than that of
Specimen B, indicating that the degree of damage of Specimen A in
matrix cracking is more serious.
3 For the specimen with MWCNTs, the strain field increment is rela-
tively small under the same stress increment and the distribution
shows the stress concentration around the round hole can be ob-
served which indicates that adding a certain amount of MWCNTs
can enhance the strength of laminates. When the specimen without
MWCNTs is about to fail, the strain field concentration around the
hole is significant with obvious changes.
4 The numerical results of the composite laminate specimens have
agreement with the experiment results showing that the composite
laminate specimens without MWCNTs exhibit lower ultimate tensile
load than the composite laminate specimens with MWCNTs. The
stress is concentrated around the hole and the stress concentration
of specimen without MWCNTs is more obvious. It was concluded
that adding amount of MWCNTs can reduce the stress concentration,
improve the strength and fracture interface stiffness of laminate
specimens and prevent the evolution of micro-cracks.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect
to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Acknowledgement
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the
National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 11502064 and
11572109).
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