A micromechanical compaction model for woven fabric preforms. Part I: Single layer

A micromechanical model was developed to investigate elastic compression behaviour during compaction of a single layer of woven fabric preform. The compaction model describes two important deformation mechanisms at different hierarchical levels, addressing micro-deformation of yarn cross-section compaction and macro-deformation of yarn bending accompanied by yarn waveform flattening. The stress carried by the fabric is decomposed into two parts in relation to two distinct mechanisms, coupled through the requirement of deformation compatibility. With this micromechanical model the effects of microstructures of single layer woven fabric on their compaction behaviour are evaluated. It is shown that both the macro-bending stiffness of fibre and the initial fibre packing ratio of yarn affect the compaction behaviour of single layer fabric preform. The prediction is correlated with experimental data available, and satisfactory agreement is observed.