Journal of Chongqing University: English Edition

Vol. 6 No. 3

September 2007

Article ID: 1671-8224(2007)03-0221-06

To cite this article: WANG Yan-lei, HAO Qing-duo, OU Jin-ping. Evaluation of in-plane shear test methods for composite material laminates [J]. J Chongqing Univ:
Eng Ed (ISSN 1671-8224), 2007, 6(3): 221-226.

Evaluation of in-plane shear test methods for composite material laminates

WANG Yan-lei 1,a, HAO Qing-duo 1, OU Jin-ping 1,2
1

School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150090, P.R. China
2

Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, P.R. China

Received 31 December 2006; revised 25 February 2007

Abstract: In-plane shear properties of composite material laminates are very important in structural design of composite
material. Four commonly used in-plane shear test methods were introduced in this paper. In order to study the differences of
various shear test methods, two ASTM standard in-plane shear test methods for composite material laminates were
experimentally investigated. They are 45 tensile shear test (ASTM D3518) and V-notched rail shear test (ASTM D7078).
Five types of composite material laminates composed of E-glass fiber fabric and vinyl ester resin were utilized, whose stacking
sequences are [0]3s, [0/90]3s, [CSM/0/90]2s, [45]3s and [(0/90)2/(45)2/(0/90)2]s, respectively. The test results indicate
that the 45 tensile shear test can predict shear moduli of composite material laminates accurately. However, the predictions
of shear strength using 45 tensile shear test are significantly lower than those of V-notched rail shear test.
Keywords: in-plane shear test; 45 tensile shear test; V-notched rail shear test; composite material laminate
CLC number: TB332
Document code: A
1 Introduction a
Advanced composite materials have been widely
applied in military structures and civil engineering.
Therefore, the accurately experimental evaluation of
the mechanical properties of these composite
materials for use in design has become increasingly
important. The determination of composite materials
shear properties is one of the more difficult tasks,
because of the anisotropic nature of these materials
and their nonlinear response in shear. An ideal shear
test method should provide a region of pure and
uniform shear, be reproducible, require no special test
equipment, and provide the entire stress-strain
response to failure from a single specimen [1-2].

WANY Yan-lei (): Male; Born 1978; PhD candidate;

Although many shear test methods have been

developed for use with composite materials over the
years, none of them completely satisfies all of these
criteria. Thus, there remains considerable confusion in
using the shear test methods.
Four most commonly used in-plane shear test
methods for composite material laminates were
described in this paper, viz. 45 tensile shear, rail
shear, Iosipescu shear and V-notched rail shear. Two
ASTM standard in-plane shear test methods were
experimentally investigated to study their differences.
They were 45 tensile shear test method (ASTM
D3518 [3]) and V-notched rail shear test method
(ASTM D7078 [4]). Five types of composite material
laminates composed of E-glass fiber fabric and vinyl
ester resin were used in this paper. .
2 Four in-plane shear test methods

Research interests: applications of composite material in civil

engineering; E-mail: chinaren@hit.edu.cn.
*

2.1 45 tensile shear test method

Funded by the Natural Science Foundation of China

(No.50308008) and Western Transportation Science and
Technology Foundation of China (No.200431882021).

In this shear test method, a [45]ns laminate is

loaded in axial tension to determine the in-plane shear
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J. Chongqing Univ. Eng. Ed.

properties. This test method is frequently used

because the specimens are easy to be fabricated and
no special test fixture is required [2]. It is a simple test
method for predicting in-plane shear modulus with an
acceptable precision [5]. However, the laminate is not
in a state of pure in-plane shear stress [6]. Thus the
calculated shear stress and strain values at failure
should only be used with caution. There are several
test standards/guides based on this test method, i.e.,
ASTM D3518 [3], BS EN ISO 14129 [7] and GB
3355 [8].

Vol. 6 No. 3

relatively small gage section is not well suited for

some textile composites with coarse fiber
architectures and large unit cell sizes. Another
weakness of the method is that the specimen is loaded
by concentrated forces on its edges. In some cases,
this may lead to edge crushing prior to shear failure.
These concentrated forces may also disturb the
uniform stress state within the gage section [1,11].
This test method has been adopted as ASTM D5379
[13] and HB 7237 [14] at present.

2.2 Rail shear test method

Rail shear test method is used to determine the inplane shear properties through two/three pairs of
loading rails (Fig.1), which are used to clamp the
specimen and introduce shear force in the specimen
[9]. The specimen is loaded on its faces, eliminating
the problem of edge crushing, and has a wide gage
region. There are three primary weaknesses of this
method. Firstly, slipping of the specimen in the rails
for the laminate with high shear strength may lead to
premature bearing failures as the bolts contact edges
of the specimen holes, thus it would nullify the test.
Secondly, the user must drill multiple holes in the
specimen, which may introduce interlamination
debonding. Thirdly, a uniform shear stress is not
developed within the specimen, and stress
concentrations are induced in the regions where the
rails are clamped onto the specimen [10-11]. ASTM
D4255 [12] is one of the test standards/guides based
on this test method.
2.3 Iosipescu shear test method
V-notched beam (Iosipescu) shear test method was
originally developed for isotropic materials by N.
Iosipescu [1]. The V-notched specimen is loaded by a
special test fixture (Fig.2a) for approaching the pure
shear state. This test specimen incorporates V-notches,
which results in a relatively uniform shear stress state
and fails within the gage section between the notches.
In general, Iosipescu shear test can obtain satisfying
results. So this method was the most commonly used
shear test method in the past [9]. However, the
Architecture & Civil Engineering

Fig. 1 Rail shear test fixture: (a) Two rails; (b) Three rails

2.4 V-notched rail shear test method

V-notched rail shear test is essentially a
combination of Iosipescu shear test and two-rail shear
test, eliminating certain weaknesses of each. It is
considered as the most promising shear test method so
far [11]. The ends of the V-notched specimen are
clamped by two pairs of loading rails and the rails
introduce shear forces into the specimen through the
specimen face. The special test fixture is shown in
Fig.2b. Compared with Iosipescu shear test method,
the present test method utilizes a specimen with a
larger gage section, and face loading allows higher
shear forces to be applied to the specimen.
Additionally, this method eliminates the problem of
edge crushing. In contrast to two-rail shear test, the Vnotched rail shear test provides specimen gripping
without the need for holes in the specimen and
eliminates potential premature bearing failures
because of the slipping the specimen introducing the
contact between the bolts and the specimen [15]. Also,
this method can obtain more uniform shear stress state
within the gage section of the specimen than two-rail
shear test [16]. ASTM D7078 [4] is the only test

WANG Yang-lei, et al. / Evaluation of in-plane shear test methods for composite material laminates

Vol. 6 No. 3

standard based on this test method at present.

Fig. 2 Test fixture of (a) Iosipescu shear; (b) V-notched rail shear

3 Specimens and tests

223

types of composite material laminates composed of Eglass fiber fabric and vinyl ester resin were selected in
the test, and the laminates were fabricated by hand
lay-up. The detailed parameters of the five types of
composite laminates are shown in Table 1. The five
types of composite laminates were among the most
commonly used composite laminates. The vinyl ester
resin with model of Swancor-901 provided by
Swancor Ltd was selected in the test. The fiber
volume fractions of the five composite laminates were
all about 30%. According to ASTM D3518 and
ASTM D7078, standard specimens were fabricated, as
shown in Fig.3. Three specimens were tested for each
type of composite material laminates.

To ensure the typicality of the contrast test, five

Table 1 Parameters of five types of composite material laminates
Label

Stacking sequence

L700
LT600

[0]3s
[0/90]3s

EMK750

[CSM/0/90]2s

BX600
COM

[45]3s
[(0/90)2/ (45)2/(0/90)2]s

Thickness/mm
4.7
4.5

b
25

90

50

45
250

r=1.3
25.3 25.4 25.3

12.7 30.6 12.7

56

Type of fabric
Unidirectional (0) fabric with weight of 700 g/m2
Bidirectional (0/90) equally proportional fabric with
weight of 600 g/m2
Compound fabric with weight of 750 g/m2, which is
composed of chopped strand mat (CSM) with weight of
300 g/m2 and bidirectional (0/90) fabric with weight of
450 g/m2. The ratio of fiber in 0 and 90 direction for
bidirectional fabric is 2.
45 equally proportional fabric with weight of 600 g/m2
12 layers laminates composed of LT600 (0/90) and BX600
(45) fabrics

76

Fig. 3 Shapes and dimensions (unit: mm) of (a) 45 tensile

specimen; and (b) V-notched rail shear specimens

Back-to-back two-element strain gauges of Model

BE120-10AA in both longitudinal and transverse
directions were used in 45 tensile shear specimens.
Back-to-back two-element (45) strain gauges of
Model BE120-6AA were mounted to the loading axis
and centered between the notches in V-notched rail
shear specimens. The notches on the V-notched rail
shear specimens were required to be aligned with the

4.1

4.4
8.7

loading center to obtain a true shear stress in the

region between two notches. The special test fixture
for V-notched rail shear test was the same as that
shown in Fig. 2b. All the tests were conducted by
universal material testing machine of Model Instron5500R. A head displacement rate of 2 mm/min was
used in all specimens. Strain data was acquired by a
strain data recording device of Model DH5935.
4 Test results and analysis
The in-plane shear properties of five composite
material laminates using 2 shear test methods are
listed in Table 2. Compared with V-notched rail shear
test, the errors of shear moduli obtained by 45
tensile shear test are all within 7%. Therefore, it can
be concluded that 45 tensile shear test can predict
the shear moduli of composite material laminates
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J. Chongqing Univ. Eng. Ed.

224

accurately. However, the predictions of shear strength

by 45 tensile shear test have big errors. The shear
strengths obtained in 45 tensile shear test are 12%
to 39% smaller than the results obtained in V-notched
rail shear test. Past test results also showed this
tendency, and it is concluded that 45 tensile shear
test may lead to an error as much as 30% to 40% in
shear strength [6].
Typical shear stress-shear strain curves of five
composite material laminates using 2 shear test
methods are shown in Figs. 4 to 8. Results from the
two tests have a very good agreement until shear
strain reaches about 0.6% in general. The curves
obtained in 45 tensile shear test gradually fall
behind the curves obtained in V-notched rail shear test
when shear strain is bigger than 0.6%. However, the

Vol. 6 No. 3

whole curves of BX600 laminate have a relatively

good agreement. Moreover, the prediction of ultimate
shear strain using 45 tensile shear test is also small.
5 Discussions
In 45 tensile shear test, a [45]ns laminate is
loaded in axial tension. The in-plane axial tensile
force induces a shear stress 12 and longitudinal and
transverse normal tensile stress, 1 and 2, in each
lamina (ply). From classical lamination theory, the
lamina shear stress and shear strain induced by the
axial force are respectively [5]

12 = x / 2 ,

(1)

12 = x y ,

(2)

Table 2 In-plane shear strengths (12,I and 12,II) and shear moduli (G12,I and G12,II) of five composite laminates by respectively I, 45 tensile,
and II, V-notched rail shear methods
Laminate

12,I/MPa

12,II/MPa

12,I
%
12,II

L700
LT600
EMK750
BX600
COM

31.78
39.74
55.35
139.68
88.26

48.37
47.04
91.18
159.45
120.97

66
84
61
88
73

40
30
20
10

93
96
94
106
96

V-notched rail
45 tension

40
30
20
10

0
0

4
3
Shear strain/%

100

Shear stress/MPa

60
40

4
3
Shear strain/%

Fig. 5 Shear stress-shear strain curves of typical LT600 laminate

180

V-notched rail
45 tension

80

Fig. 4 Shear stress-shear strain curves of typical L700 laminate

Shear stress/MPa

2.49
2.40
3.08
6.52
3.67

50

V-notched rail
45 tension

G12,I
%
G12,II

G12,II/GPa

2.32
2.31
2.89
6.94
3.52

Shear stress/MPa

Shear stress/MPa

50

G12,I/GPa

V-notched rail
45 tension

150
120
90
60
30

20

0
0
0

4
3
2
Shear strain/%

Fig. 6 Shear stress-shear strain curves of typical EMK750 laminate

Architecture & Civil Engineering

0.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

Shear strain/%

Fig. 7 Shear stress-shear strain curves of typical BX600 laminate

WANG Yang-lei, et al. / Evaluation of in-plane shear test methods for composite material laminates

Vol. 6 No. 3

140
V-notched rail
45 tension

Shear stress/MPa

120
100
80
60
40
20
0
0

Shear strain/%

Fig. 8 Shear stress-shear strain curves of typical COM laminate

where 12 is lamina shear stress (ply material

coordinate axis); 12 is lamina shear strain; x is
laminate axial stress (laminate coordinate axis); x is
laminate axial strain; and y is laminate transverse
strain.
The lamina shear modulus, G12, is determined by
dividing Eq. (1) by Eq. (2).
G12 = 12 / 12

(3)

However, the laminae are not in a state of pure

shear. In-plane normal stresses exist that are a
function of the applied axial stress x and the shear
stress xy induced in each ply. The normal stresses for
the +45 plies are [1]

1 = ( x + xy ) / 2 ,

(4)

2 = ( x xy ) / 2 .

(5)

The sign of the induced shear stress, xy, must be

reversed in Eqs. (4) and (5) to describe the normal
stresses in 45 plies.
All angle-ply laminates also have interlaminar
stresses near the free edges of the laminates [9]. These
typically become negligible beyond about one
laminate thickness from each edge. The only non-zero
interlaminar stress in a []ns angle-ply laminate is the
stress xz, stresses yz and z being equal to zero. The
stress xz is a maximum for [11.5]ns laminates and is
approximately one-fourth this magnitude for [45]ns
laminates [1].
When the intent is to determine the in-plane shear
properties (12) in 45 tensile shear test, interlaminar
shear (13) is also present in the specimen (associated
with the scissoring action of the 45 laminate under
load), along with axial (1) and transverse (2) tensile

225

stresses in each ply [1]. Although the axial tensile

stresses may not be particular detrimental because of
the high stiffness and strength in this (fiber) direction,
the transverse tensile stresses can be quite detrimental
because of the typically low strength of the material in
this direction. The effect of transverse tensile stresses
on a given ply is minimized by the fiber reinforcement
of the neighboring piles. Moreover, the surface plies
of a given specimen being constrained by only one
neighboring ply (as opposed to interior plies, which
are constrained by a ply on each side) represent the
weakest link in a 45 specimen. During the tensile
loading of this test specimen, the first ply failures
consist primarily of tensile stresses (or mixed mode)
failures, rather than pure shear failures. Because of
this, the actual material shear strength can not be
obtained from this test. Except for the case of
materials capable of sustaining large axial test
specimen strains (greater than about 3.0%), the shear
stress at failure is believed to underestimate the actual
material shear strength [3].
The result is that the test specimen actually fails
under a combined stress state, with the failure mode
depending upon the relative magnitudes of the inplane shear, interlaminar shear, and transverse tensile
strength of the particular composite material being
tested. Thus, sometimes the in-plane shear strength
presumably being measured agrees well with other inplane shear test results, but sometimes it may be
considerably lower.
6 Conclusions

Five types of E-glass fiber fabric/vinyl ester resin

laminates were fabricated by hand lay-up, and tested
by two ASTM standard in-plane shear test methods:
45 tensile shear test (ASTM D3518) and V-notched
rail shear test (ASTM D7078). Typical shear stressshear strain curves of the five composite material
laminates were obtained. Compared with V-notched
rail shear test, 45 tensile shear test can predict shear
moduli of composite material laminates accurately
with the biggest error of 7%. However, the prediction
of shear strength using 45 tensile shear test has a
bad precision with the error as much as 12% to 39%.
Moreover, the predictions of shear strain in the state
Architecture & Civil Engineering

J. Chongqing Univ. Eng. Ed.

226

of high shear stress using 45 tensile shear test also

have some errors. 45 tensile shear test provides a
simple test method for predicting in-plain shear
modulus with an accepted precision. However, the
laminate is not in a state of pure in-plane shear stress,
because an in-plane normal stress component is
present through the gage section and a complex stress
field is present close to the free edges of the laminate.
Thus the calculated shear stress and strain values at
failure should only be used with caution.

Vol. 6 No. 3

plane shear stress/shear strain response, including the inplane shear modulus and strength by the 45 tension test
method [S]. London: British Standards Institute, 1998.
[8]

China State Bureau of Standards. GB 3355-82 Test

method for longitudinal transverse shear (L-T shear)
properties of fiber reinforced plastics [S]. Beijing: China
State Bureau of Standards, 1982. (In Chinese).

[9]

Hodgkinson JM. Mechanical testing of advanced fibre

composites [M]. London: Woodhead Publishing Ltd.,
2003.

[10] Hussain AK, Adams DF. An analytical and experimental

Acknowledgements

evaluation of the two-rail shear test for composite

materials,

This work was partially funded by the Natural

Science Foundation of China (No.50308008) and
Western Transportation Science and Technology
Foundation of China (No.200431882021).

UW-CMRG-R-98-105

[R].

Laramie:

University of Wyoming at Laramie; 1998.

[11] Adams DO, Moriarty JM, Gallegos AM, et al.
Development and evaluation of the V-Notched rail shear
test for composite laminates, DOT/FAA/AR-03/63 [R].
Washington D. C.: FAA Office of Aviation Research,

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Edited by ZHAO Jing

Architecture & Civil Engineering