Department of Aerospace Engineering

Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur

AE 681 Composite Materials
Hashins Failure Criteria for Unidirectional Fibre Composites
These are interacting failure criteria where more than one stress components have
been used to evaluate the different failure modes. These criteria were originally developed
for unidirectional polymeric composites, and hence, applications to other type of laminates
and non-polymeric composites have significant approximations. Usually Hashin criteria are
implemented within two dimensional classical lamination approach for point stress
calculations with ply discounting as the material degradation model. Failure indices for
Hashin criteria are related to fibre and matrix failures and involve four failure modes. The
criteria are extended to three dimensional problems where the maximum stress criteria are
used for transverse normal stress component.
The failure modes included in Hashins criteria are as follows.
1. Tensile fibre failure for
11
0
2
2 2
12 13 11
2
12
1 failure
1 no failure
T
X S

_ +
+
'
<
,
2. Compressive fibre failure for
11
< 0
2
11
1 failure
1 no failure
C
X

'
<
,
3. Tensile matrix failure for
22
+
33
> 0
( )
13
2
2 2
2
12 22 33
23 22 33
2 2 2
23 12
1 failure
1 no failure
T
Y S S

+ +
+ +
'
<

4. Compressive matrix failure for

22
+
33
< 0
( )
13
2 2
2 2
2
12 22 33
22 33 23 22 33
2 2 2
23 23 23 12
1 failure
1
1 no failure 2 4
C
C
Y
S Y S S S

1
+ + _ _ +
1 + + +
'
<
1 , ,
]
Department of Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
Course: AE 681 Composite Materials
Instructor: PM Mohite
1
5. Interlaminar tensile failure for
33
> 0
2
33
1 failure
1 no failure
T
Z

'
<
,
6. Interlaminar compression failure for
33
< 0
2
33
1 failure
1 no failure
C
Z

'
<
,
where,
ij
denote the stress components and the tensile and compressive allowable strengths
for lamina are denoted by subscripts T and C, respectively. X
T
, Y
T
, Z
T
denotes the
allowable tensile strengths in three respective material directions. Similarly, X
C
, Y
C
, Z
C
denotes the allowable tensile strengths in three respective material directions. Further, S
12
,
S
13
and S
23
denote allowable shear strengths in the respective principal material directions.
Reference:
Hashin Z. Failure criteria for unidirectional fibre composites, ASME Journal of Applied
Mechanics, Vol. 47 (2), 1980, pp 329-334.
Department of Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
Course: AE 681 Composite Materials
Instructor: PM Mohite
2