Interlaminar stresses in composite laminates with a circular hole

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a recently developed analytical model by Ko & Lin which determines the interlaminar stress distributions around a circular hole in symmetric composite laminates under in-plane tensile loading. For this purpose, a three-dimensional finite-element (FE) analysis is performed and the stress distributions for symmetric cross-ply laminates are presented in three ways: through the thickness; along radial lines away from the hole; and around the hole. Because a mathematical interlaminar stress singularity is expected between the 0° and 90° plies at the hole, the computed normal stress σz and the shear stress τz0 are presented near but not at the hole edge. There is good qualitative agreement on τz0 but the FE results are considerably higher by a ratio of between 3 and 5 than those predicted by the Ko-Lin analysis. For σz, again the FE values are considerably higher, but there is also poor qualitative agreement. The delamination initiation load and delamination location are predicted by using the FE and Ko-Lin stress results together with a quadratic failure criterion. © 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.