Giorgio Maria d’Orazi

PhD Thesis

Design Manufacturing, characterisation and certification of composite laminates with unconventional stacking sequences

Supervisors

Andrea Cini (UC3M)

Abstract

Composites allow designers to tailor structures at the material level, assigning, not only the material distribution, but changing ply material, orientation, shape, number and stacking sequence to locally obtain therequired mechanical properties. The large number of variables, however, increases the complexity ofthe design process fo:n;ingdesigners to preselect stacking sequences (quasi-isotropic materials) and applytraditional methods for metal structures (black­ metal design). The suggested projecthas the objective of overcoming current composite design limitation by enabling effective non-blackmetal design and aeroe1astic tailoring. Manufacturing, and certification constraints will be exerted without limiting the design space by rules and analytical models to take into account industrialisation and feasibility aspects.

The research activities will include design, manufacturing, characterisation and certification of composite material with unconventional stacking sequences for mechanical performance enhancement and aeroelastic tailoring. The concurrent definition of material design and manufacturing process considering their mutual constraints is a cost effective and time efficient way to develop optimised manufacturable solutions reducing the risks of non-compliances, redesign iterations and process plan modifications. Airworthiness authorities prescribe a list of safety requirements to obtain flight certification. Safety regulation compliance must be demonstrated by means oflarge and expensive testing campaign consisting of aeroelastic flight tests and structural building blocktestpyramids. Considering certification requirements since the early material design phase is necessary to smooth the product development phase and shorten the time-to-market. The so-called desi1m for certification approach in fact limits the amount of redesign actions on mature components needed to ensure airworthiness. The project aims at embedding a design for certification approach by testing and simulating compliance with structural integrity requirements.

Doctoral Meetings

2024 – 2025

Poster