Investigation of the Crashworthiness Performances and the Effect on Passengers of a Double-Double Designed Skin in a Composite Fuselage Barrel

The aviation industry is increasingly turning to composite materials for manufacturing high-performance components, necessitating efficient methods to optimize the design of composite laminates. Initially used to replace metals, composites are now being further optimized to enhance performance and reduce weight. This involves adjusting the number and orientation of plies, with approaches such as Double-Double (DD) laminates proving effective for improving strength and reducing weight, regardless of symmetry or orientation. Crashworthiness evaluation remains crucial for assessing the performance of composite aircraft structures, particularly in optimized components such as fuselages. In this work, the crashworthiness performance of a composite fuselage barrel section has been investigated when a new design based on the Double-Double laminates is considered for the skin. Accordingly, a detailed numerical model of the fuselage barrel section structure have been developed in the finite element software Ls-Dyna to simulate a drop test phenomenon. An Anthropomorphic Tesh Device has been placed on the seat to analyze loads experienced during the impact when the skin design changes. A comparison of the lumbar load recorded by the dummy in both configurations has been performed with the aim to prove the effectiveness of the proposed Double-Double design for the skin for ensuring aircraft passengers safety.