Simulates Surface Removal and Temperature Patterns of Multi-Material Aerospace Laminates under Extreme Atmospheric Heat Conditions
This computational procedure enables the commercial, general purpose finite element analysis (FEA) software, ABAQUS, to simulate the ablation of laminated composite materials, aiding the development of thermal protection systems for aerospace structures subject to extreme heat environments. During exposure to extreme heat, thermal protection materials undergo the process of ablation, or the progressive removal of surface materials. Developing effective thermal protection systems for aerospace vehicles and other high temperature machinery requires accurate modeling of the ablation and temperature distribution patterns of potential shielding materials. In addition to certain restricted analysis tools, commercially available FEA software, such as ABAQUS, allow users to model ablation problems for homogeneous materials. However, their computational procedures cannot model the ablation of composite laminates, which incorporate multiple material domains in their overall structure. This has hindered the development of promising laminated composite materials into materials the aerospace industry can use for thermal protection.
Researchers at the University of Florida have developed a computational procedure for the FEA software ABAQUS that allows users to calculate temperature distribution and ablation profiles for laminated composite materials (e.g., carbon fiber epoxy laminated composite) under extreme heating conditions. The ablation modeling software will lead to improved thermal protection system designs for aerospace vehicles and equipment.
Application
Enable the commercial, general purpose finite element analysis (FEA) software, ABAQUS to model ablation patterns of laminated composite materials to improve the designs of thermal protection systems. This element deletion computational procedure can also be converted to an element activation computational procedure to model laser additive manufacturing.
Advantages
- Models ablation and temperature distribution patterns of composite materials in extreme heat conditions, improving designs of aerospace thermal shields that use non-homogeneous composite laminates
- Achieves accurate composite ablation modeling in the commercial FEA software ABAQUS, ensuring cost-efficiency and a high level of versatility, usability, and technical support
Technology
This ABAQUS computational procedure predicts the thermal and ablation response of composite laminate structures that consist of multiple layers of different materials. The procedure conducts heat transfer (or electric-thermal coupled) analysis with multiple user subroutines. The user subroutines enable users to define temporal and spatial distributions of the heat flux, remove elements at a prescribed ablation criteria (e.g., prescribed ablation temperature), and automatically update the boundary conditions after the elements are deleted. A set of MATLAB scripts control the execution of the numerical implementation, identify IDs of ablated elements, update ABAQUS input files, and perform restart analyses after elements are deleted and boundary conditions are updated. This computational procedure solves the relevant temperature and ablation depth equations sequentially across time increments. Since elements are progressively removed from one material domain to another and boundary conditions are automatically updated, the system enables ablation modeling of non-homogeneous laminated composite materials.
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