• Proceedings of the Korean Society For Composite Materials Conference
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• 2004.04a
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• pp.275-278
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• 2004

In this paper, the fracture strength of the surface damaged laminates was predicted by applying the fracture strengths of the unflawed and flawed laminates. For prediction, the theoretical equation about the fracture strength of laminates was simplified applying classical laminate theory and was applied to the surface damaged laminates. Lagace's and Tsai's experimental data were used for verifying the theoretical equation. Moreover, to verify the theoretical prediction, an experiment was performed. Surface unflawed laminate and flawed laminates were fabricated and the experiments were made and these results were compared with theoretical predictions. The specimens' fiber direction was same to the tensile direction and the theoretical predictions and the experimental results were showed good agreement. Therefore, by this equation, the fracture strength of structures made of composites will be able to be predicted when the surface of the structures was damaged.