Analysis of the effect of coupling in Steel/Aluminium laminate under bending and tension load

Abstract

This project involves the study of the effects of coupling in Steel/Aluminium laminate subjected to tension and bending load. The engineering simulation and design software, ANSYS, was used to aid the simulation and analysis of the laminate under load. Finite element modelling was applied to obtain the results in this report. To carry out the simulation, a cantilevered laminate plate of thickness 2.72mm, width 200mm and length 500m is loaded at the tip. This load was varied from 5N to 25N. The plies within the laminate is increased from 2 to 8 with the thickness kept constant throughout. The Aluminium and Steel laminate produced a coupling effect presented in this report. It is found that the stiffness increases with the number of plies in the laminate.