Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

www.elsevier.com/locate/compstruct

Modelling soft body impact on composite structures

Alastair F. Johnson *, Martin Holzapfel
German Aerospace Center (DLR), Institute of Structures and Design, Pfaenwaldring 38-40, D-70569 Stuttgart, Germany

Abstract
The paper describes recent progress on materials modelling and numerical simulation of soft body impact damage in bre reinforced composite structures. The work is based on the application of nite element (FE) analysis codes to simulate composite shell
structures under impact loads arising, for example, from bird strike on a wing leading edge. A composites ply damage mechanics
model and interply delamination model have been implemented in an explicit FE code which is used to predict impact damage in
shell structures. Soft body impactors such as gelatine (substitute bird) or ice (hailstones) are highly deformable on impact and ow
over the structure spreading the impact load. They are modelled by a particle method in which the FE mesh is replaced by interacting particles. The failure models and code developments are applied to the numerical simulation of gas gun impact tests in
which gelatine projectiles are red at glass fabric/epoxy cylindrical shells.
2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Impact modelling; Composite structures; Damage mechanics; Delamination; SPH methods

1. Introduction
The paper describes recent progress on materials
modelling and numerical simulation of soft body impact
on bre reinforced composite structures. To reduce
certication and development costs, computational
methods are required by the aircraft industry which are
able to predict structural integrity of composite structures under impact from soft bodies such as birds,
hailstones and tyre rubber. Key issues are the development of suitable constitutive laws for modelling composites in-ply and delamination failures, determination
of composites parameters from high rate materials tests,
materials laws for soft body impactors, and the ecient
implementation of new materials models into FE codes.
Impact modelling and simulation of impact damage
in composite structures have been extensively studied in
recent years, since composite structures are susceptible
to impact damage due to low bre failure strains which
lead to brittle failure modes with low energy absorption.
The comprehensive review by Abrate [1] discusses impact failure mechanisms in composite structures and
summarises impact modelling approaches, based mainly
on analytical models. The emphasis in this paper is on
*

Corresponding author. Tel.: +49-711-6862-297; fax: +49-711-6862227.

E-mail address: alastair.johnson@dlr.de (A.F. Johnson).

development and validation of numerical methods with

nite element (FE) techniques which are suitable for
use in assessment of impact damage in composite aircraft structures. Damage arising from impact loads is
modelled within the framework of continuum damage
mechanics (CDM) and these damage models are implemented into explicit FE codes. Damage mechanics
for composite materials is an extensive subject, with
dierent philosophies and schools of thought, and is well
documented in the monograph by Talreja [2]. Several
authors have been concerned with the development of
CDM materials laws for composites failure within FE
codes, see for example the works of Williams et al. [3,4],
Iannucci et al. [5], Ladev
eze [6], and Ladev
eze and Le
Dantec [7]. The work here is based on the CDM formulations of Ladeveze and his co-workers, which provides a framework within which in-ply and delamination
failures may be modelled. A ply failure model was developed for fabric reinforced plies [8] with three scalar
damage parameters representing modulus reductions
under dierent loading conditions due to microdamage
in the ply, and a delamination model for interply failure
in laminates requires two further interface damage parameters. Damage evolution equations were introduced
relating the damage parameters to damage energy release rates in the ply and interface. The formulation
of the damage evolution equations in the Ladeveze
CDM models is more physically based than in other

0263-8223/03/$ - see front matter 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/S0263-8223(03)00033-3

104

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

work [35], in which convenient mathematical functions

are chosen rather than materials test data. It also allows
generalisations to include features such as shear plasticity and delamination modelling. In the present work
test data on carbon and glass fabric/epoxy materials
have been used to determine the damage evolution
equations and lead to a simplied model in which bre
tension/compression behaviour is elastic damaging and
may be decoupled from the elasticplastic ply shear
damage. The CDM ply and delamination models have
been implemented by ESI GmbH in their explicit FE
crash and impact code PAM-CRASH/SHOCK [9]. The
ply damage model is implemented in layered composite
shell elements and the delamination model is introduced
using stacked shell elements with a contact sliding interface condition.
The paper summarises the CDM failure models for
composites in Section 2 and then describes recent work
on code validation in which impact simulations are
compared with test data from a series of gas gun tests of
composite shell structures subjected to impact from
gelatine projectiles at velocities in the range 100200
m/s, which is an impact condition relevant to civil aircraft structures subjected to foreign object damage
(FOD) and bird strike. Most reported research on impact in composite structures [1,3,5] concentrates on
impact damage and modelling from rigid body impactors. However, for aircraft structures soft body impactors such as gelatine (substitute bird) or ice (hailstones)
are highly deformable on impact and ow over the
structure, spreading the impact load. For reliable damage prediction in composite structures it is thus necessary to develop modelling techniques and appropriate
data for highly deformable impactors. Ice impact in
composite plates has been studied in some detail both
experimentally and theoretically by Kim and Kedward
[10]. They used an elasticplastic ice model with solid
elements for the ice projectiles. However, this method
was found to be less suitable here for gelatine impactors
due to the excessive element distortion on impact. Iannucci [11] discusses suitable materials laws for gelatine
as it ows during impact. Section 3 describes how these
soft impactors are modelled by an alternative smooth
particle hydrodynamic (SPH) method, in which the FE
mesh is replaced by interacting discrete particles. Data
from pressure pulses measured during gelatine impact
on rigid plates are used to determine parameters for a
gelatine material equation of state (EOS) [11] for use
with the SPH method. In Section 4 the composites
failure models and code developments are applied to the
numerical simulation of gas gun impact tests in which
gelatine projectiles are red at glass fabric/epoxy cylindrical shells. Test conditions and impact energies were
chosen to give both delamination failures and bre
damage. Results are presented, which demonstrate that
it is possible to simulate impact failure modes and fail-

ure progression during soft body impact loading in

composite structures.

2. Failure models for fabric reinforced composites

The development of numerical design tools for predicting impact damage in composite aircraft structures
was the main objective of the EU funded HICAS project
[12]. During impact loading of composite structures
failure may occur by delamination, which is important
in lower energy impacts and in failure initiation, and by
in-plane ply failure which controls ultimate fracture and
penetration in the structure. Attention was thus given in
the HICAS project to the development and improvement of composites failure models suitable for implementation into explicit FE codes. The approach adopted
was to use CDM for composites as developed by Ladev
eze [6] as a framework within which in-ply and delamination failure may be modelled. The mathematical
models developed and FE code implementations are
summarised in this section.
2.1. Elastic ply damage mechanics model
The fabric reinforced composite ply is modelled as a
homogeneous orthotropic elastic or elasticplastic
damaging material whose properties are degraded on
loading by microcracking prior to ultimate failure. A
CDM formulation is used in which ply degradation
parameters are internal state variables which are governed by damage evolution equations. Constitutive laws
for orthotropic elastic materials with internal damage
parameters are described in [6,7], and take the general
form
ee Sr;

1
e

where r and e are vectors of stress and elastic strain,

and S is the elastic compliance matrix. For shell elements a plane stress formulation with orthotropic symmetry axes x1 ; x2 is required. The inplane stress and
strain components are
r r11 ; r22 ; r12

ee ee11 ; ee22 ; 2ee12 :

Using a strain equivalent damage mechanics formulation, the elastic compliance matrix S may then be
written:
0
1
1=E1 1  d1
m12 =E1
0
A;
S @ m12 =E1
1=E2 1  d2
0
0
0
1=G12 1  d12
3
where m12 is the principal Poissons ratio, which for
simplicity is assumed here not to be degraded. The ply
model introduces three scalar damage parameters d1 , d2 ,
d12 which have values 0 6 di < 1 and represent modulus

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

reductions under dierent loading conditions due to

microdamage in the material. For fabric plies d1 and d2
are associated with damage or failure in the principal
bre directions, and d12 controls in-plane shear damage.
In the general damage mechanics formulation [6] conjugate forces or damage energy release rates Y1 , Y2 , Y12
are introduced corresponding to driving mechanisms
for materials damage, and it is shown that with the
compliance matrix (3) they take the form:
2

Y1 r211 =2E1 1  d1 ;
Y2

r222 =2E2 1

Y12

and cut o at upper damage energy thresholds (Y1f ,

Y12f ), the assumed forms for the damage parameter
functions fi are:
d1 0; Y 1 6 Y10 d1 a1 Y 1  Y10 ; Y10 < Y 1 < Y1f
d1 1; Y 1 P Y1f ;
d2 0; Y 2 6 Y10 d2 a1 Y 2  Y10 ; Y10 < Y 2 < Y1f
d2 1; Y 2 P Y1f ;
d12 0; Y 12 6 Y120
Y120 < Y 12 < Y12f

d12 a12 ln Y 12  ln Y120 ;

d12 1; Y 12 P Y12f :

 d2 ;

r212 =2G12 1

105

6
2

 d12 :

The damage parameters are dened in terms of the

damage evolution functions f1 , f2 , f12 and have the
general form: d1 f1 Y1 ; Y2 ; Y12 , d2 f2 Y1 ; Y2 ; Y12 and
d12 f12 Y1 ; Y2 ; Y12 .
Specic forms for the evolution equations are required which should be consistent with test data. The
elastic damage mechanics ply fabric model is based on
the following assumptions:
(a) Fibre and shear damage modes are decoupled, with
bre damage determined by Y1 and Y2 , and shear
damage by Y12 .
(b) Fibre damage development may be dierent in tension and compression.
(c) For balanced fabrics E1 E2 damage development
in the two bre directions may be dierent, thus
d1 6 d2 . However, it is assumed that f1 and f2 will
have the same functional form f1 f2 .
(d) The ply material is non-healing; therefore damage
during unloading is held constant until positive
loading is applied which causes further damage accumulation.
(e) Damage development does not necessarily lead to
ultimate failure of the ply and a global failure criterion is also necessary.
Due to condition (d) above, the damage evolution
equations are based on the maximum value of the
damage forces reached during the previous loading
history. We thus introduce the quantities Y 1p
, Y 2 , Y 12
which are dened in terms of the maxima of Yi . Test
data on unidirectional (UD) composites [7] has shown
that the square root of the damage forces is the quantity
which arises more naturally, therefore:
p
Y 1 t maxf Y1 sg;
p
Y 2 t maxf Y2 sg;
p
Y 12 t maxf Y12 sg; s 6 t:
5
Taking into account (a) and (c) above, and assuming an
elastic region without damage at the onset of loading,
leading to lower damage energy thresholds (Y10 , Y120 ),

Study of ply stressstrain data for glass fabric/epoxy

in [8] showed that linear forms for d1 and d2 , were good
approximations for fabric plies, and an equation linear
in lnY 12 was found to be suitable for modelling the
shear behaviour at larger strains. Thus in the model the
evolution equations for a balanced fabric ply require
the determination of two slope parameters a1 , a12 and
four damage threshold parameters Y10 , Y120 , Y1f , Y12f .
Further renements to the model, allowing dierent bre damage behaviour in tension and compression, with
an ultimate failure envelope are discussed in [8].
2.2. Elasticplastic model for fabric composites ply
For in-plane shear, deformations are controlled by
matrix behaviour which may be inelastic, or irreversible,
due to the presence of extensive matrix cracking or
plasticity. On unloading this can lead to permanent
deformations in the ply. The extension of the fabric
model to include these irreversible damage eects is now
considered, based on the following additional assumptions:
(f) The total strain in the ply is split into the sum of
elastic and plastic (or inelastic) parts.
(g) Plastic strains are associated only with the matrix
dominated in-plane shear response.
(h) A classical plasticity model is used with an elastic
domain function and hardening law applied to the
eective stresses in the damaged material.
(i) Inelastic or plastic strain increments are assumed to
be normal to the elastic domain function.
From (f) above the total strain e can be written as the
sum of elastic ee and plastic strains ep e ee ep . The
elastic strain component is given by (2). A plane stress
model for a thin ply is assumed and only shear strains
contribute to plasticity (ep11 ep22 0, ep12 6 0). Following [7], an elastic domain function is introduced
F ~
r12 ; R where r~12 is the eective shear stress r~12
r12 =1  d12 and R is an isotropic hardening function.
Rp is a function of an inelastic strain variable p. The
elastic domain function has a simple form here since

106

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

only the eective shear stress leads to plastic deformation:

F jr12 j=1  d12  Rp  R0 ;

where it is assumed that R0 0 and that R0 is the

initial threshold value for inelastic strain behaviour.
The condition F < 0 corresponds to a stress state
inside the elastic domain where the material may be
elastic damaging. It follows from the normality requirement (i) that F 0, F_ 0, hence from (7) it can be
deduced that the plastic strain p is dened by
Z ep
12
p
e_12 p_ =1  d12 or p
1  d12 dep12
8
0

showing that p is the accumulated eective plastic strain

over the complete loading cycle. The model is completed
by specifying the hardening function Rp. This is determined from cyclic loading tests in which both the
elastic and irreversible plastic strains are measured. A
typical form assumed for the hardening function [7]
which models test data fairly well is an index function,
which leads here to the general equation:
Rp bpm :

The shear plasticity model depends on the parameters b,

the power index m and the yield stress R0 .
2.3. Delamination model
Delamination failures occur in composite structures
under impact loads due to local contact forces in critical
regions of load introduction and at free edges. They are
caused by the low, resin dominated, through-thickness
shear and tensile properties found in laminated structures. In composites delamination models [13,14] the
thin solid interface is modelled as a sheet of zero
thickness, across which there is continuity of surface
tractions but jumps in displacements. The equations of
the model are given here for the case of mode I tensile
failure at an interface. Let r33 be the tensile stress applied at the interface, u3 the displacement across the
interface, and k3 the tensile stiness. Following [14] an
elastic damaging interface stressdisplacement model is
assumed:
r33 k3 1  d3 u3 ;
d3 c1 1  u30 =u3 ;

for u30 6 u3 6 u3m ;

10

with tensile damage parameter d3 , and c1 u3m =

u3m  u30 . It can be veried that with this particular
choice of damage function d3 , the stressdisplacement
function has the triangular form shown in Fig. 1, and
u30 , u3m correspond to the displacement at the peak
stress r33m and at ultimate failure. The damage evolution
constants are dened in terms of r33m and GIC , the
critical fracture energy under mode I interface fracture,
by u30 r33m =k3 and u3m 2GIC =r33m . From these ex-

Fig. 1. Idealised mode I interface stressdisplacement function.

pressions it can be shown that the area under the curve

in Fig. 1 is equal to the fracture energy GIC . This interface model therefore represents an initially elastic
interface, which is progressively degraded after reaching
a maximum tensile failure stress r33m so that the mode I
fracture energy is fully absorbed at separation. For
mode I interply failure the interface energy GI , dened
as
Z u3
GI
r33 du3
11
0

is monitored and, if this is found to exceed the critical

fracture energy value GIC , then the crack is advanced.
For mode II interface shear fracture a similar damage
interface law to (10) is assumed, with equivalent set of
damage constants, u130 , u13m and critical fracture energy
GIIC . In general there will be some form of mixed mode
delamination failure involving both shear and tensile
failure. This is incorporated in the model by assuming a
mixed mode failure condition, which for mode I/mode II
coupling could be represented by an interface failure
envelope such as [14]:

n 
n
GI
GII

eD 6 1;
12
GIC
GIIC
where GI and GII are the monitored interface strain
energy in modes I and II respectively, GIC and GIIC are
the corresponding critical fracture energies and the
constant n is chosen to t the mixed mode fracture test
data. Typically n is found to between 1 and 2. Failure at
the interface is imposed by degrading stresses when eD <
1 using (10) and the corresponding shear relation. When
eD P 1 there is delamination and the interface separates.
2.4. Code implementation and validation
In order to apply the composites failure models developed above in the analysis of composite structures it
is necessary to implement and validate the models in a
suitable FE code. In recent years explicit FE methods
have proved successful for the analysis of dynamic,
highly non-linear problems, particularly where contact
plays an important role. Experience has shown that this

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

technique provides a robust and reliable method for

composite structures where instabilities due to ply
buckling, material softening caused by microdamage,
contact between delaminated plies and contact with
impacting bodies can be eciently and reliably treated.
In collaboration with the software company Engineering
Systems International the CDM ply and delamination
models were implemented in the commercial explicit
crash and impact code PAM-CRASH/SHOCK [9] and a
number of validation studies at the element and test
specimen level have been carried out, as described in
[15].
The CDM elasticplastic ply model has been implemented in the multi-layered MindlinReissner shell element which is used to model a composite ply, a
sublaminate or the complete laminate, depending on the
detail required. A novel approach has been developed to
implement the delamination model of Section 2.3 into
the code in which the laminate is treated as a stack of
shell elements. Each ply or sublaminate ply group is now
represented by one layer of shell elements and the individual ply layers are tied together using a sliding interface with an interface tractiondisplacement law.
This approach gives a good approximation for delamination stresses and failure, with the advantage that the
critical integration timestep is larger since it depends on
the area size of the shell elements rather than the interface thickness. Thus large composite structures may
be modelled eciently with shells, or stacked shells, requiring fewer elements than solid models, and computationally expensive interface solid elements are
eliminated. In this stacked shell laminate model the interface equations such as (10) are applied to determine
tractions and displacement discontinuities at the interface under mixed mode tension/shear loading, and the
condition (12) used to separate adjacent stacked shell
elements at delamination failure.
In the HICAS project [12] an extensive materials test
programme was carried out on carbon and glass fabric
reinforced epoxy materials including in-plane and
through-thickness tension, compression and shear tests.
Cyclic shear tests were also conducted which showed the
importance of the plastic strain contribution. Test data
were used rst to justify the chosen forms for the
damage evolution equations (6) and shear plasticity
hardening law (9), then to obtain the required materials
parameters for the model. The analysis procedures for
determining the ply damage and plasticity parameters
are described in detail in [8]. The materials dataset obtained has been used as the basis for code validation on
single elements and materials test specimens. Specimen
tests show signicant material nonlinearity due to elastic
damage and plastic shear strain on unloading, which
were successfully modelled in PAM-CRASH and which
veried the damage/plasticity model and choice of evolution curves and hardening function. The delamination

107

model requires interface fracture energy data under

mode I GIC , mode II GIIC and the fracture response
under mixed mode loading. Pure modes I and II data
are obtained from double cantilever beam (DCB) and
end notched exure (ENF) tests respectively, whilst
mixed mode data requires a specialised test which can
propagate an interface crack under a predetermined
ratio of GI and GII as discussed in [16]. Mixed mode
delamination tests were simulated by stacked shell elements in [15] with typical GIC and GIIC data for the
toughened epoxy resin system used and with a linear
interaction parameter n 1, giving good agreement
with test data.
Low velocity impact tests with steel impactors on
carbon fabric/epoxy plates were simulated with the code
and the results presented in [15]. The drop tower test
results showed both penetration damage and delamination failure in the plates, depending on impact energy.
The importance of including both delamination failure
and ply failure in a stacked shell model to correctly
predict the measured penetration loads was demonstrated. In the present paper attention is turned to further validation studies on impact simulations of
composite shell structures, which have been impacted
with soft impactors in gas gun impact tests. An impact
test programme with gelatine as a soft body impactor
was carried out in [12] with test conditions and impact
energies chosen to give both delamination failures and
bre damage. In order to predict damage and failure in
these composite shell structures it is necessary to give
attention to suitable models for the soft body impactors,
since they strongly inuence structural failure modes.
Possible methods for modelling such eects are discussed in the next section.

3. Modelling soft body impactors

Soft bodies such as gelatine are used by the aircraft
industry as substitute birds and are observed to ow
over the structure on impact, spreading the impact load
over a signicant surface area which limits local impact
damage. The two main problems in simulating the bird
behaviour are dening the materials model for the soft
material, and overcoming the high mesh distortion
which causes numerical problems with the time step in
explicit codes. The approach being adopted by the DLR
is to use the SPH method to model the ow and large
deformations in the impactor, in which the FE mesh for
the impactor is replaced by interacting particles. This is
combined with a materials law for a hydrodynamic
solid in which the pressurevolume relation is modelled
by an EOS [11]. Data from pressure pulses measured
during gelatine and bird impact on rigid plates are used
to calibrate material parameters for a gelatine material
EOS for use with the SPH method. The SPH method

108

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

and EOS used have been implemented in PAM-SHOCK

[9], which was used for the simulations presented here.
3.1. The SPH method
Simulation of impacts in which the impactor is highly
deformed or fragmented into a debris cloud on impact is
a major challenge for FE codes. The main problems in
using a conventional FE model with Lagrangian mesh
are mesh distortion in the high deformation or ow regions which causes time step and stability problems and
the diculty in modelling disintegration of the impactor. To overcome this a gridless Lagrangian technique
has been developed known as SPH in which the solid FE
mesh is replaced by a set of discrete interacting particles.
The method was developed originally [17] for problems
in astrophysics, and is now being applied to hypervelocity impacts (10 km/s) in the design of protection
shields for space structures [18,19]. The SPH method is
also appropriate for impactor models in bird strike or
soft body impact in aircraft structures, where the impact
speeds are much lower (100300 m/s), because of the
large deformation and ow of the impactors.
SPH is a gridless computational method whose
foundations are in interpolation theory. The material is
represented as a set of discrete particles (interpolation
points) which are topologically independent from each
other. The two main features of the model are the kernel
approximation and the particle approximation. The
continuum mechanics conservation equations of mass,
momentum and energy are transformed from partial
dierential equations to integral equations through the
use of a smoothing kernel function which provides the
kernel estimate of the eld variables at a position in
space. These smoothing kernels must vanish, or become
very small outside a radius which is proportional to the
smoothing length h, and in the limit that h ! 0 the
kernels approach the delta function. Thus the kernel
function denes a range of inuence of a point in the
continuum. Integration by parts of the integral equations
allows the unknown spatial derivatives of the eld variables to be replaced by known derivatives of the kernel
functions. The particle approximation is now applied to
replace the continuous domain of inuence at a point by
a set of discrete neighbouring particles. It then follows
that the transformed integral eld equations are replaced
by summations over discrete particles within the region
of inuence of a point. Each particle has an associated
mass, velocity and stress state which will evolve according to the discretised eld equations. The development of
the discretised eld equations is given in [17] along with
discussions of suitable kernel functions.
These equations have now been incorporated as the
SPH solver option in PAM-SHOCKe [9], with a Bspline as kernel function chosen so that it tends to zero
at a position 2h from its peak value. The smoothing

length h can be chosen as xed, or a variable parameter

proportional to the radius of an interparticle region and
subject to lower and upper limits. The time step is dened in terms of the smoothing length and the sound
speed in the material. An articial viscosity is added to
smooth out shock discontinuities, as is usual in explicit
FE codes. The initial particle distribution is generated
automatically from a conventional solid FE mesh, with
mass and particle density determined from those of the
original solid element. Standard features of PAMSHOCK such as penalty contact laws and application of
boundary and initial conditions are also available with
the SPH solver. Contact laws are also valid between
particles and conventional FEs, so that it is possible to
combine an SPH impactor model with an FE structural
model.
3.2. EOS for impactor
In order to use the SPH method for these simulations
a constitutive law for gelatine is required with suitable
materials parameters. The material model used is referred to as an elasticplastic hydrodynamic solid,
which was originally developed for ballistic impact
in metals, and describes an isotropic elasticplastic
material at low pressures, with an EOS describing the
hydrodynamic pressurevolume behaviour at high
pressures. To model gelatine impacts, the elasticplastic
contribution to the materials behaviour may be neglected so that the model reduces to the EOS for the
pressure p, which is assumed in this case to have the
polynomial form:
p C0 C1 l C2 l2 C3 l3 ;

l q=q0  1

13

where C0 , C1 , C2 and C3 are materials constants and l is

a dimensionless parameter dened in terms of the ratio
of current density q to initial density q0 . The polynomial
form is an established approximation of the observed
EOS for many materials, see for example [20], with the
feature that it reduces to a dilatational elastic materials
law with bulk modulus C1 , when C0 C2 C3 0.
Suitable values are required for the constants Ci in the
polynomial EOS. Since these constants refer to the dynamic behaviour of gelatine at impact pressures they are
dicult to measure directly and have to be determined
indirectly. The approach used is to calibrate the materials parameters by comparing impact simulation results
with test data on the behaviour of impactors during
impact. Wilbeck [21] has measured impact pressures of
several materials, including rubber, gelatine and chickens and found that pressure pulses have a characteristic
form. This consists of a high peak pressure caused by
shock wave propagation in the impactor, followed by a
lower fairly constant pressure due to steady ow of the
impactor onto the target. Furthermore, the EOS for
water could be used as a basis for predicting peak

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

pressures behind a 1-D shock front which were similar

to those measured in the test programme. For a material
such as water which exhibits the linear Hugoniot relation between shock velocity vS and particle velocity vP :
vS c0 kvP ;

14

where k is a materials constant and c0 the sound speed in

the material, Wilbeck shows that the pressuredensity
relation across a shock has the general form
p q0 c20 g=1  kg2 ;

where g 1  q0 =q l=1 l:
15

It follows that on expanding (15) for small and moderate

values of l it takes the form of the polynomial EOS (13)
with:
C1 q0 c20 ;

C2 2k  1C1 ;

C3 k  13k  1C1 :
16

Furthermore C0 is the initial equilibrium pressure in the

impactor, generally assumed to be negligible, and from
the denition (16) it follows that C1 is the bulk modulus
of the impactor material.
Wilbeck showed that with values for the Hugoniot
constant k and sound speed c0 for water the predicted
pressure peak across the shock front for gelatine impactors tted test data fairly well. However, for real
chickens the pressure pulse had lower peak pressures
and was wider. Since the aim of the simulation tools is to
simulate real bird impacts on structures, it was recommended to use materials constants in the EOS which
represent a mixture of water with about 10 % air. The
air content has the eect of reducing density, and lowering the bulk modulus and sound speed. Thus it is
possible to determine the EOS constants using a rule of
mixtures model, as proposed by Wilbeck [21] and Iannucci [11]. This is the procedure used here to calibrate
the SPH model by nding suitable values of q0 , c0 and k
to represent the EOS of a water/air mixture which t
available impact test data.
Wilbeck [21] measured pressure pulses on a target
plate during impact of birds and several substitute bird

109

materials (gelatine, porous gelatine, rubber). A requirement for aircraft wing structures is to survive impacts from a 1.82 kg (4 lb) bird, which is thus the mass
frequently used for substitute bird impactors and for
which there is impact pressure pulse test data. An impactor geometry was specied as a solid cylinder with two
hemispherical end caps, with cylinder length 114 mm,
diameter 114 mm, and end cap radius 57 mm. A solid
FE model was developed for the impactor and the target
plate was assumed to be rigid and was meshed with a
circular cylindrical grid to facilitate comparison with
spreading of the bird on impact. A ne FE mesh was
adopted for the impactor which when converted to an
SPH mesh consisted of 4320 uniformly spaced particles
in a quarter model. The polynomial EOS was used to
describe the materials behaviour of the gelatine, with
constants Ci dened in (16). Values of these constants
were chosen to represent porous gelatine (water/air
mixture) with dierent volume fractions of air as discussed in [11]. The impactor was given an initial impact
velocity normal to the target plate, and a Coulomb
friction law was assumed between impactor and plate.
Various parameter studies were made to determine the
inuence of numerical parameters such as the smoothing
length h, friction coecient and the EOS constants.
Finally a dataset for the EOS was selected for the gelatine which corresponds to porous gelatine (water/air
mixture with 10% air by volume). The density q0 938
kg/m3 was chosen so that the impactor mass was 1.82
kg. The EOS constants did not have a signicant inuence on the deformation and ow of the bird, but were
critical for the prediction of peak pressure pulses on the
target.
Fig. 2 shows the simulation sequence of the 1.82 kg
impactor impacting a rigid plate at 225 m/s. The SPH
method captures very well the ow of the gelatine onto
the target as an expanding disc shaped region. These
large ow eects are dicult to model well with a
standard Lagrange FE mesh and show the advantage of
using the SPH method. A more critical test of the simulations is to compare the pressure pulses at the centre
of the plate during impact with test data as shown in

Fig. 2. SPH simulation of bird impact on rigid plate (M 1:82 kg, V0 225 m/s).

110

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

malised ow pressures of about 1.5. At 116 m/s impact

the predicted pressures at the centre of the rigid target
plate are calculated to be steady ow pressures of 9.5
MPa and a peak shock pressure of 31.7 MPa, with a
pulse length of 1.96 ms. The good general agreement
with measured pressure pulse data from the literature
gives condence in the SPH model for the impactor and
the values of the constants assumed in the EOS. Note
that for this test case the ow pressure is well above the
expected compression strength of gelatine, which justies the neglect of the elasticplastic contribution to the
impactor material law, and the peak pressure is high
enough to cause damage in composite structures.
.

Fig. 3. Normalised pressure in gelatine impact at 116 m/s: comparison

with test data from [21].

Fig. 3. The gure shows a typical simulated pressure

pulse at the centre of the target plate for a porous gelatine impactor model for impact velocity of 116 m/s.
The test data were taken from Wilbeck [21] and is presented as normalised pressuretime curves, based on a
normalised time tN and normalised pressure pN :
tN tV0 =

pN p=12q0 V02

17

where V0 is the impact velocity and the impactor

length. The normalised plot is used extensively by Wilbeck and tN 1 corresponds to the time taken for the
free end of the cylinder with initial velocity V0 and length
to reach the target, so that this denes the impact pulse
length. The pressure pN 1 is equivalent to an impact
pressure p 1=2q0 V02 , which is the pressure predicted
by Bernoullis equation for a steady uid jet with impact
velocity V0 . To determine pressures it was necessary to
compute normal contact forces over an element or
group of elements at the centre of the target plate. Fig. 3
shows pressures calculated at a single 5 mm 5 mm
element, compared with a larger region of 4 such elements. The only dierence is in the peak pressures,
showing how localised these are at the centre of the
impactor.
The results conrm that the impactor pulse predicted
by the SPH simulation has a steady ow region with
pressures given by the simple jetting model. This is
preceded by the short duration pressure peak at the
Hugoniot shock, which has an overpressure ratio compared with the steady ow. The peak pressure is critically dependent on the uid model used and the size of
the contact area. The shape of the simulated pressure
pulse in Fig. 3 on porous gelatine agrees well with test
data from Wilbeck at 116 m/s impact velocity. Peak
pressures occurred at about tN 0:05, with peak normalised pressures pN of about 5.56.0 and steady nor-

4. FE simulation of gelatine impact on composite shell

structures
An important objective of the HICAS project [12]
was to validate the composites damage modelling
methods described here by comparison of impact test
data on idealised composite structures with FE simulations. These modelling and code validations are described in detail in [15] for low velocity (26 m/s) drop
weight plate impacts with rigid impactors, and in [22] for
gas gun impact tests on cylindrical shells in the range
100200 m/s with steel ball projectiles. Both of these
studies indicated good predictions of damage development due to impact with steel impactors, showing the
inuence of delamination during impact in the subsequent failure development, and for the composite shells
the role played by large shell bending in storing impact
energy was demonstrated. In this earlier work quantitative comparisons with measured impactor force pulses
from the drop weight tests and with strain gauge data
from the gas gun tests gave satisfactory agreements with
simulations. The present paper is concerned with validation of the SPH soft body impactor model used
together with the composites shell damage and delamination model by simulating gas gun impact tests
with gelatine projectiles on idealised composite shell
structures. In this case detailed quantitative test data are
not available, since it is not possible to instrument a
gelatine impactor and ow of the gelatine usually
damages strain gauges bonded onto the outer shell
surface. Here the validation is restricted to comparison
of predicted damage with the test structure after gas gun
impact.
An impact test programme was carried out at the
DLR in which composite shells, typical of a wing leading edge prole, were tested with soft body gelatine
cylinder projectiles. Fig. 4 shows the leading edge shell
structure and Fig. 5 the gas gun setup. The composite
shells were fabricated in glass fabric (GF)/epoxy with a
quasi-isotropic lay-up [0/45]2S and nominal thickness 2
mm. The shells had a length 200 mm, with a sharp nose

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

Fig. 4. Geometry of leading edge shell showing impact damage.

Fig. 5. DLR gas gun set up.

prole having radius 15 mm. For the test the shells were
bonded into grooves in a steel backing plate, approximating a xed edge condition, with the curved edges left
free. The gelatine cylinder projectiles had diameter 30
mm and length 40 mm with masses in the range 3034 g.
The gelatine used was bovine hide gelatine (260 bloom).
After fabrication the specimens have a soft rubbery
consistency with a coarse granular texture, and on impact they fragment into smaller granules which ow
over the target before dispersal in the impact chamber.
The projectiles were supported by PU foam sabots
during acceleration in the gas gun.
The shells were impacted at the centre of the leading
edge on the convex face at dierent impact velocities
chosen to give dierent levels of impact damage. Impact
angles were normal to the leading edge with an inclination of 0 to the plane face of the shells. After impact
testing C-scan tests were carried out on the shells with a
hand held probe to determine the extent of delamination
damage and the delamination boundary marked. Three
leading edge shells were tested at impact velocities 132.5,
142.0 and 198 m/s chosen to give a range of damage

111

conditions. In all the tests the gelatine cylinders disintegrated indicating that they had owed over the shell
nose as observed in high speed lm sequences, so that
the impact load is spread over a wide area and there is
very little penetration of the shells, compared with steel
ball impact tests. At the lowest impact velocity 132.5 m/s
there was surface scratching, but no measurable delamination found by C-scan. At 142.0 m/s damage was
observed at the leading edge in the impact region. On
increasing the impact velocity to 198 m/s there was extensive delamination over a wide region and signicant
bre cracking, as shown in the impacted specimen Fig.
4. In addition there was also extensive cracking at the
middle region of the curved shell wall which was well
away from the impact point. This shows that there was
extensive shell bending which extended beyond the nose
region.
For the impact simulations with PAM-CRASH a
stacked shell FE model was developed for the leading
edge structure, based on eight stacked shells for the
laminate which corresponds to the eight ply quasi-isotropic layup. The straight edges at the rear of the shell
are xed, as in the test, with the curved edges left free.
An SPH model is used for the gelatine cylinders as described in Section 3. From an extensive materials test
programme on GF/epoxy test specimens carried out in
[12], materials parameters for the ply fabric damage and
plasticity model were determined as discussed in more
detail in [8]. The parameters required for the delamination model were based on typical published values of
GIC and GIIC for GF/epoxy. Simulation of impacts at
130 m/s led to mainly elastic deformation in the shell,
which returned to its original shape after impact with
little signicant delamination or bre damage, in line
with the test at this velocity. Computed results for
normal impact at the centre of the leading edge at 200
m/s are shown in Fig. 6, and it is seen that the SPH
gelatine model ows over the leading edge in a similar
manner to that observed in tests. Fig. 6(a) shows the
shell deformation at 0.4 ms, with highly deformed gelatine projectile and delamination damage, and Fig. 6(b)
shows the middle ply damage contours at 0.4 ms. Fig. 4
is a photograph of the damaged leading edge after impact at 198 m/s. It shows clearly bre cracks at the impact contact point, corresponding to the maximum ply
damage values, and the marked delamination region
obtained from the C-scan tests (marked by silver
boundary) is similar to the size of the computed delaminations. For gas gun impact tests quantitative load
pulse data to compare with simulated results are dicult
to obtain, however qualitatively there is good agreement
with observed deformations and damage conditions.
They indicate that a simulation technique with an SPH
impactor model and shell or stacked shell structural
model is very promising for simulating soft body impacts in composite structures.

112

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

Fig. 6. Impact simulation of the GF/epoxy leading edge (M 0:033 kg, V0 200 m/s). (a) Delamination contours at 0.4 ms. (b) Ply damage contours
at 0.4 ms.

5. Concluding remarks
The paper has described recent progress on materials
modelling and numerical simulation of soft body impact
on bre reinforced composite structures. The work is
based on the application of explicit FE analysis codes to
simulate composite shell structures under impact from
highly deformable soft impactors such as gelatine or ice,
which may ow over the structure spreading the impact
load. These soft impactors are modelled here by the SPH
method, in which the FE mesh is replaced by interacting
particles. It is very dicult to measure the impactor
properties under relevant dynamic load conditions for
use in the SPH model. The method adopted was to
calibrate the parameters required for the EOS by simulating gelatine impacts on rigid target and comparing
geometrical ow characteristics and pressure pulses
observed in high speed tests with simulation results.
In impact of soft bodies on composite structures in
the velocity range 100200 m/s both delamination and
ply failures were found to be important, depending on
the impact energy levels. A composites failure model
which includes ply damage and interply delamination
model has been developed and was used here to predict
impact damage in the shell structures. Numerical simulations using the SPH impactor model with the composites failure model were compared with gelatine
impact test data on glass fabric/epoxy cylinders and gave
encouraging results. Ongoing work is concerned with
introducing rate dependent eects into the composites
materials models and the calibration of the EOS suitable
for other impactor materials. Future developments
which are important in aircraft safety studies include the
application of FE methods to simulate aircraft structures under impact from birds, burst tyres, hail stones
and runway debris.
Acknowledgements
Much of this work was developed in the EU project
HICAS [12]. The authors wish to acknowledge nancial

support from the CEC and the HICAS partners for their
scientic contribution, with particular thanks to Dr.
Anthony Pickett ESI for implementing the composites
models in PAM-CRASH and help with the FE simulations.

References
[1] Abrate S. Impact on composite structures. Cambridge, UK:
Cambridge University Press; 1998.
[2] Talreja R, editor. Damage mechanics of composite materials.
Composite materials series, vol. 9. Amsterdam: Elsevier; 1994.
[3] Williams KV, Floyd AM, Vaziri R, Poursartip A. Numerical
simulation of in-plane damage progression in laminated composite plates. 12th International Conference on Composite Materials
(ICCM-12), 1999, Paris, France.
[4] Williams KV, Vaziri R. Finite element analysis of the impact
response of CFRP composite plates. 10th International Conference on Composite Materials (ICCM-10), 1995, Whistler,
Canada.
[5] Iannucci L, Dechaene R, Willows M, Degrieck J. A failure model
for the analysis of thin woven glass composite structures under
impact loadings. Comput Struct 2001;79:78599.
[6] Ladev
eze P. Inelastic strains and damage. In: Damage mechanics
of composite materials. Talreja R, editor. Composite materials
series, vol. 9. Amsterdam: Elsevier; 1994 [chapter 4].
[7] Ladev
eze P, Le Dantec E. Damage modelling of the elementary
ply for laminated composites. Compos Sci Technol 1992;43:257
67.
[8] Johnson AF. Modelling fabric reinforced composites under
impact loads. Composites A 2001;32:1197206.
[9] PAM-SHOCKe/PAM-CRASHe FE Code. Engineering Systems
International, F-94578 Rungis Cedex, France.
[10] Kim H, Kedward KT. Experimental and numerical analysis
correlation of hail ice impacting composite structures. 40th AIAA
Structures, Structural Dynamics and Materials Conference, St
Louis, 1999, AIAA-99-1366.
[11] Iannucci L. Bird strike impact modelling. I. Mech. E. Seminar
1998, Foreign Object Impact and Energy Absorbing Structures,
Inst. of Mech. Engineers, London.
[12] HICAS: High Velocity Impact of Composite Aircraft Structures.
CEC DG XII BRITE-EURAM Project BE 96-4238, 1998.
[13] Allix O, Ladev
eze P. Interlaminar interface modelling for the
prediction of delamination. Compos Struct 1992;22:23542.
[14] Criseld MA, Mi Y, Davies GAO, Hellweg HB. Finite element
methods and the progressive failure modelling of composite

A.F. Johnson, M. Holzapfel / Composite Structures 61 (2003) 103113

[15]

[16]
[17]
[18]

[19]

structures. CIMNE Barcelona. In: Owen DRJ et al., editors.

Computational plasticityfundamentals and applications, Part 1.
1997. p. 23954.
Johnson AF, Pickett AK, Rozycki P. Computational methods for
predicting impact damage in composite structures. Compos Sci
Technol 2001;61:218392.
Reeder JR, Crews JJ. Mixed-mode bending method for delamination testing. AIAA J 1989;28/7:12706.
Monaghan JJ. Smoothed particle hydrodynamics. Ann Rev Astro
Astrophys 1992;30:54374.
Groenenboom PHL. Numerical simulation of hypervelocity
impact using the SPH option in PAM-SHOCK. Int J Impact
Engng 1997;20:30923.
Kamoulakos A, Groenenboom PHL. Moving form FE to SPH
for space debris impact simulationsexperience with PAM-

113

SHOCK. Proceedings of European Conference on Spacecraft

Structures: Materials and Mechanical Testing, Braunschweig,
Germany, 1998.
[20] Hiermaier S, Thoma K. Computational simulation of high
velocity impact situations using smoothed particle hydrodynamics. 9th DYMAT Technical Conference on Materials and Structural Modelling in Collision Research, TU Munich, Munich,
Germany, 1995.
[21] Wilbeck JS. Impact behaviour of low strength projectiles. Air
Force Materials Laboratory, Technical Report AFML-TR-77
134, 1977.
[22] Johnson AF, Holzapfel M. Computational methods for predicting
impact damage in engineering composite structures. 5th World
Congress on Computational Mechanics, WCCM V, Vienna,
Austria, 2002.