Delamination Effect on the Buckling Behaviour of Carbon–Epoxy Composite Typical Aeronautical Panels

The instability of structures due to compression is one of the most critical issues related to aircraft components. Especially in composite materials, which have poor out-of-plane mechanical properties, the buckling load must be assessed to ensure that the structures are within the safe limits compared to the operating loads. In the presence of delamination, the compression instability of structures becomes catastrophic, as the propagation of delamination can dramatically reduce the stiffness of the structure almost instantaneously. During the operational life of composite aircraft components, one of the most common events that can occur is low-velocity impact with foreign objects, which is one of the primary reasons for delamination. In this paper, a sensitivity analysis is presented on a typical aerospace reinforced panel with a circular delamination, representative of an impact damage. Different configurations have been analysed, varying the radius and position along the thickness of the delamination. Furthermore, some geometric parameters of the panel have been modified to evaluate how the buckling load and the propagation of interlaminar damage evolve.