• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.1908-1918
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• 1991

Fatigue tests have been carried out to measure the degradation of the residual strength and the fatigue life in carbon/epoxy (0/45/90/-45)$_{2s}$ composite materials. Theoretical predictions of residual strength and fatigue life were compared with experimental results. Distribution characteristics were studied using the probability of failure based on the cumulative distribution function and median rand. The static ultimate strength of carbon/epoxy composites used herein is observed to be relatively higher than that of existing similar composites ; while fatigue life is shorter due to the brittleness of matrix. The fatigue life obtained in these experiments is shorter than that estimated by residual strength degradation model when the stress level above 0.6 For the stress level of 0.6, the experimental value was abruptly increased. The cumulative distribution function for the static ultimate strength is well correlated to that for the strength converted from the measured fatigue life. Also, the predicted distribution of residual strength shows good agreement with the experimental results. Therefore, it is proven that the residual strength degradation model is reasonable.e.