Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588

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Computational Materials Science

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/commatsci

Modeling and experimental evaluation of functional failure pressures

in glass fiber reinforced polyester pipes
Roham Rafiee ⇑, Ali Amini
Composites Research Laboratory, Faculty of New Sciences and Technologies, University of Tehran, End of The North Karegar St., Tehran 1439955941, Iran

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The main objective of this paper is to predict the functional failure pressure of Glass fiber Reinforced Poly-
Received 18 February 2014 ester (GRP) pipes subjected to hydrostatic internal pressure. A progressive modeling procedure is devel-
Accepted 18 March 2014 oped to predict the internal pressure associated with weepage. The developed modeling consists of stress
Available online 29 April 2014
analysis, failure evaluation and material degradation. The influence of micromechanics rules for estimat-
ing mechanical properties of constructing layers and failure criteria for predicting failure occurrence are
Keywords: examined in comparison with experimental observations and the best combinations of them are identi-
Composite pipes
fied. First-ply failure and functional failure pressures are determined and compared. A parametric study
Functional failure
Winding angle
is conducted investigating the effect of fiber volume fractions and winding angles on the failure pres-
Fiber volume fraction sures. The study is performed on five different volume fractions of 52.5%, 55%, 57.5% and 60% and three
Progressive modeling different winding angles of 52.5°, 57.5° and 60.19°. The results show that the functional and first-ply fail-
ure pressures decrease by increasing fiber volume fractions; while the higher winding angles (measured
from the axial axis of pipe) enhance functional failure pressures.
Ó 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
In the last decades, fiber reinforced plastic (FRP) pipes have
been broadly used in many industrial applications including the
storage and transfer of chemical fluids, municipal piping, power
plants, irrigation and potable water transmission systems. Unique
characteristics like light weight, high strength and stiffness, high
corrosion resistance, smooth internal surface and easy joining sys-
tems are all rendered FRP pipes as the main competitors of tradi-
tional concrete, steel and asbestos pipes in aforementioned fields
of applications.
FRP pipes are most commonly manufactured using filament
winding method. For the high pressure applications; filament
winding method is employed; wherein dry fibers pass through a
resin bath and then applied onto a rotating mould via travelling
trolley commuting from one end to the other end. This procedure
which is schematically shown in Fig. 1 together with industrial
production line is commercially called filament winding process.
Adjusting the travelling speed of the trolley in accordance with
the rotating speed of the mould, angle piles are constructed. Mea-
sured from the axial axis of the pipe, the angle plies are always in
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +98 2161118506.
E-mail address: Roham.Rafiee@ut.ac.ir (R. Rafiee).
the form of balanced angle ply (±h) due to the winding process.
These plies are also called cross plies. Hoop plies are also fabricated
when fibers are placed in the circumferential direction and perpen-
dicular to the axial axis of the pipe wherein the winding angle is
approximately 89. Due to the combinations of cross and hoop plies
in the wall construction of FRP pipe, anisotropic behavior is
expected from structural point of view. Consequently, both longi-
tudinal and hoop tensile strengths have to be taken into account
as the design constraints for the FRP pipes.
FRP pipes can be either installed as aboveground pipes or bur-
ied/underground pipes. The former is required to fulfill the stan-
dard requirements for mentioned constraints while the later
should also meet a certain value of stiffness indicating pipe resis-
tance against external transverse loadings.
In addition to the aforementioned design constraints, the
soundness of the pipe is examined by a hydrostatic test according
to the ASTM: D3517-11, wherein the pipe is filled with water and
the internal pressure is gradually increased up to the two times of
the pipe nominal pressure. The pipe should withstand this certain
level of the internal pressure without any visually observed leak-
age, weeping or structural failure. In this experiment, pipes may
experience two different failure modes in the form of burst or leak-
age. The burst failure usually takes place in smaller pipes with very
low numbers of layers; while the leakage failure occurs in the pipes
with higher diameters with higher numbers of layers. The burst

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.commatsci.2014.03.036
0927-0256/Ó 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
580 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588
Fig. 1. Schematic (left) and industrial scale (right) representation of filament winding process for pipes (by courtesy of ALH Co., Iran).
failure which is categorized as structural failure characterizes the
limit loading pressure and it is always considerably higher than
the pressure associated with leakage failure. Sometimes, in large
diameter pipes the burst pressure cannot be realized through
experimental observation due to the limited load bearing capacity
of the test apparatus. The leakage failure known as functional fail-
ure implies on a certain pressure that the fluid finds a path through
the pipe wall thickness as a consequence of weepage phenomenon.
The main reason that this failure is called as functional failure is
placed behind this fact that the failed pipe cannot sustain its mis-
sion anymore due to the experienced leakage and despite the fact
that from structural point of view it would be able to support the
loading, but it is failed from functional viewpoint.
Due to the layered structure of FRP pipes, the functional failure
occurs in a progressive series of events. Practically, while multiple
cracks form in a lamina, the stiffness of the matrix is degraded and
as a result, neighboring fibers and other plies carry higher level of
loading. In fact, the first ply failure and functional failure do not
take place simultaneously and a material degradation model needs
to be used in the damage analysis. This will be led to the higher
pressures attributed to the functional failure in comparison with
expected internal pressure resulted in the first ply failure. This
can be considered as an advantage of FRP layers which can accom-
modate higher level of loadings. Resulting in over designed and
uneconomical pipe, the maximum sustainable internal pressure
is simply underestimated using first ply failure criterion. Therefore,
predicting functional failure pressure is of great importance.
Several analytical, numerical and experimental studies have
been presented predicting mechanical properties and failure
behavior of composite pipes in literature.
The effect of the degree of interweaving of fibers on the
mechanical performance of cylindrical structures was character-
ized by Rousseau et al. under various loadings [1]. Beakou and
Mohamed showed that the optimum fiber winding angle can sig-
nificantly vary with the scattering of some design variables [2].
To do this, they used reliability analysis in which the stresses were
computed based on classical laminated membrane theory and
Tsai-Wu failure criterion. An exact solution for stresses and strains
of multi-layered filament winding pipes under internal pressure
was proposed by Xia et al. based on three-dimensional (3D) aniso-
tropic elasticity [3]. Afterwards, they developed an exact solution
based on the classical laminated-plate theory for filament-wound
fiber-reinforced sandwich pipes under pure bending [4]. Similar-
ity, Parnas and Katirci conducted the stress analysis of pressure
vessels subjected to internal pressure, axial force and body force
due to rotation in addition to temperature and moisture variation
by considering elastic deformations [5]. Mertiny and Ellyin investi-
gated the effect of the applied tow tension during filament
winding on the physical and mechanical properties of GRP
composite pipes [6].
In term of failure and damage of composite pipes, Ellyin et al.
studied stress–strain and failure behavior of multidirectional fila-
ment wound fiberglass/epoxy tabulars under various stress ratios
(axial stress/hoop stress) experimentally [7].
Chang used acoustic emission technique to identify first ply fail-
ure of filament wound pressure vessels [8]. The obtained results
showed a good agreement with failure criteria such as Hoffman,
Hill and Tsai-Wu. Meijer and Ellyin recorded failure envelopes
for filament wound glass fiber reinforced epoxy tubulars [9]. They
performed multiaxial tests under various ratios of axial stress and
circumferential stress in an MTS testing system on tubes produced
by filament winding technique and reported the first observed
mode of failure. Melo et al. [10] evaluated short term hydraulic
failure pressures of a GRP pipe through experimental observations
and also predicted the pressure associated with first ply failure
using FEA and failure criteria for composites.
A numerical and experimental study was carried out by Martins
et al. to investigate the failure pressure of filament wound compos-
ite tubes for small tubes (about 100 mm as diameter) with closed-
end loading conditions and subjected to internal pressure [11].
They implemented an alternative damage model using the user
subroutine (UMAT) in ABAQUS commercial software to perform
the progressive damage modeling. Martins et al. also studied the
effect of hoop/axial stress ratio on fracture morphology of filament
wound composite pipes and performed and comparative study
between two boundary conditions of closed-end and restrained
ends both experimentally and numerically [12]. They suggested
that the stress ratio of 2H:1A is adequate for commodity pipes
under real operational conditions in service despite its conserva-
tive nature. An advanced modeling procedure on the basis of pro-
gressive damage modeling using stiffness and strength
degradation rules was developed by Rafiee for laminated compos-
ite pipes with quartz sand core layer to obtain the apparent hoop
tensile strength of FRP pipes [13].
2. Problem statement
The aim of this study is to develop a modeling procedure to pre-
dict the pressures at which the first ply failure and weepage occurs
in all plies of the FRP pipes subjected to internal hydrostatic pres-
sure. The structural and mechanical properties of the produced
pipes are mainly affected by design parameters of pipe geometry
and filament winding manufacturing method comprised of pipe
diameter, sequence of plies, winding angle, volume fraction of fiber
and ply thickness. The effect of fiber volume fraction and winding
angle on the functional failure of FRP pipes is investigated using an
appropriate progressive damage modeling during hydrostatic pres-
sure tests. A progressive damage modeling is constructed using
stiffness and strength degradation rules employing finite element
 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588
modeling. The results are validated using experimental data
obtained through short-term hydrostatic test.
A parametric study is conducted to evaluate failure occurrence
in each ply and to identify the mode of failure using different fail-
ure criteria and different stiffness and strength degradation rules in
comparison with experimental results.
3. Experimental study
The investigated pipes in this section are produced using fila-
ment winding process. The length of all pipes is 12 m with
700 mm diameter. At the first stage, the inner layer called as liner
is produced on cylindrical mould. The aforementioned inner layer
is comprised of stitched glass fiber mat (450 g/m2), surface mat
(30 g/m2) and unsaturated polyester resin with the approximate
thickness of 1.5 mm. The liner which will be in direct contact with
water during the service prohibits direct exposure of structural lay-
ers to water providing a chemical barrier. The liner is cured using
infrared heaters and then winding process is employed to construct
structural layers on the liner. A bundle of E-glass direct roving com-
prising of 42 strands with the bandwidth of 180 mm is impregnated
with unsaturated polyester resin and then wound around the liner
layer fabricating structural layers with configurations of [90/
±52.53]. The weight of roving in grams per kilometer (1000 m) is
known as TEX which is 2400 for the used E-glass direct roving in
production process. The fabricated structural layers are also cured
for a certain time while the pipe is kept rotating on the mould. Fol-
lowing the mentioned procedure, three pipes with the same diam-
eter, length and wall construction have been produced.
The mechanical properties of direct roving and resin are given
in Table 1. The average fiber volume fraction of the pipes is
obtained as 56.63% following the mentioned procedure in ASTM:
D3171.
Each pipe is kept for a week to accomplish the post-cure process
and then it is placed in hydrostatic pressure testing machine
shown in Fig. 2. The ends are sealed using blind FRP flanges and
double o-rings. Both ends are free to slide on the o-rings, so no
axial loading is induced in the pipe. The axial force of blind flanges
is reacted out by the tie bars mentioned in the test apparatus.
Expelling all entrapped air inside the pipe, the pipe is filled with
water. Internal water pressure is applied and increased gradually
till the weepage is observed in the form of appearing droplets on
the surface of the pipe.
According to the experimental reports, the average of functional
failure pressures is measured as 2.5 MPa. Inspecting the pipe sur-
face after the experiment, no evidence of structural failure in failed
region has been observed.
4. Theoretical study
4.1. Model preparation
The stress components induced in each and every ply have to be
calculated when the pipe is subjected to internal hydrostatic pres-
sure. FE method is employed to conduct stress analysis and obtain
stress distribution in structural layers of GRP pipes. Commercial FE
Table 1
Mechanical properties of direct roving and orthotropic polyester resin.
Mechanical properties Fiber
Young modulus (GPa) 70
Shear modulus (GPa) 28.69
Poisson’s ratio 0.22
Tensile strength (MPa) 1970
Compressive strength (MPa) – 130
Density (g/cm3) 1.15
581
software of ANSYS 11.0 was used for this purpose and SHELL99 ele-
ment is chosen from element library. This element has 8 nodes in
total, 4 at the corners and 4 at the mid lengths and each node has 6
degrees of freedom.
The thickness of each ply is calculated using below formulation:
2  qCA
tcross ¼ ð1Þ
qFRP  W f
qHA
thoop ¼ ð2Þ
qFRP  W f
where tcross and thoop is the thickness of cross layers in the form of
[±h] and the thickness of hoop layers along the circumferential
direction, respectively. Other parameters reflected in this formula-
tion are determined using the following equations:
 
qFRP ¼ V f qf þ V m qm ð3aÞ
NS T
qCA ¼ ð3bÞ
BSinh
V f qf
Wf ¼ ð3cÞ
V f qf þ V m qm
NS T
qHA ¼ ð3dÞ
B
where qf, qm and h stands for the density of roving, the density of
resin and the winding angle of ply measured from longitudinal axis
of the pipe. Vm, Vf and T represents matrix/resin volume fraction,
fiber volume fraction and the TEX of roving. In filament winding
of FRP pipes, a filament bundle consisting of defined numbers of
roving strands instead of single roving strand is used to reduce
the production cycle time as depicted in Fig. 1. In above formula-
tions, B denotes the width of the roving sheet which is referred to
as band width and NS is number of roving strands in the roving
sheet. As it was previously mentioned, the investigated pipe is pro-
duced using 42 numbers of E-glass strands with 2400 TEX and band
width of 180 mm.
For the boundary conditions, one end has been constrained
while the other end is left free simulating the conditions of the test
apparatus shown in Fig. 2 in absence of any axial load (1:0). The
length of the pipe is selected two meters and results are read in
the mid-span of the pipe length avoiding any edge effect distur-
bance on the results.
Micromechanics rules have been employed to calculate
required mechanical properties for FE analysis on the basis of fiber
volume fraction and inserted properties in Table 1. The longitudi-
nal Young’s modulus and major Poisson’s ratio of a ply are calcu-
lated using modified rule of mixture [14]. Transverse and shear
Young’s modulus can be calculated using modified rule of mixture
[14] and Chamis formulation [15], respectively. Mentioned proper-
ties can be also evaluated using semi-empirical formulation known
as Halpin–Tsai model [16].
The accuracy of the employed sets of micromechanics rule in
estimating transverse and shear moduli of FRP layers for the case
of FRP pipes and also the influence of formulations on the mechan-
ical behavior of FRP pipes in comparison with experimental obser-
Matrix vations will be investigated in the next sections. The other required
mechanical properties for 3D FEA of a pipe are mentioned in below
3.5
1.32 equations:
0.33
78
Ezz ¼ EY ; Gxz ¼ Gxy ; Gyz ¼ Ey =ð2 þ 2myz Þ; mxz ¼ myz ¼ 0:2 ð4a; b; c; dÞ
In above equations, subscripts of X, Y and Z refer to local coor-
2.56
dinate system of each ply.
582 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588
Fig. 2. Hydrostatic pressure testing machine (by courtesy of ALH Co., Iran).
4.2. Stress analysis
Linear static analysis is performed to obtain stress distribution
in each and every ply comprising of in-plane longitudinal, trans-
verse and shear stress/strain components. Since the pipe will not
experience large deformation and obtained deflection is negligible
in comparison with the general dimensions of the pipe, a linear
static analysis is acceptable. The distributions of the maximum
stress components for the pipe with [90/±52.53] lay-up configura-
tion are shown in Fig. 3 when the pipe is subjected to 1 MPa inter-
nal hydrostatic pressure and clamp-free boundary conditions are
applied. The results are presented for the fiber volume fraction of
50%. The required mechanical properties are calculated using mod-
ified rule of mixture for longitudinal Young’s modulus and major
Poisson’s ratio and Halpin–Tsai formulation for transverse and
shear Young’s modulus.
As it can be seen from Fig. 3, the contribution of out-of-plane stress
components can be ignored in comparison with in-plane
stress distributions. Both maximum longitudinal and transverse
stress components occur in the hoop layer.
To verify the results obtained through FEA, a pipe with inner
radius of 50 mm and [±55]2 lay-up configuration is constructed.
The mechanical properties of the composite layer with thickness
of 0.5 mm is presented in Table 2. The closed–closed boundary
conditions and internal hydrostatic pressure of 10 MPa are applied
to the model. A comparison between obtained results after FEA and
theoretical modeling developed by Xia et al. [3] is depicted in
Fig. 4.
To verify the results for the closed-free boundary conditions, a
finite element model of a pipe with inner radius of 30 mm and
lay-up configuration of [±55]3 is constructed. The mechanical prop-
erties of the ply are inserted in Table 2 and the thickness of each
ply is considered as 0.417 mm. The pipe is subjected to internal
hydrostatic pressure of 10 MPa and obtained results in comparison
with available analytical solution presented by Hu et al. [17] are
shown in Fig. 5.
The very good agreement between obtained results from FEA
and analytical methods has established our confidence toward
the appropriate FE modeling procedure for off-axis stress
components.
A macro is written in APDL of ANSYS to perform the whole pro-
cedure of FE modeling and analysis of any arbitrary composites
pipes. The required input by user is limited to the pipe diameter,
type of boundary conditions, amount of internal hydrostatic pres-
sure, lay-up configurations and mechanical properties of constitu-
ents, i.e. glass fiber and resin. The in-plane longitudinal, transverse
and shear stress components of each and every ply are reported as
the output of the code.
4.3. Failure evaluation
In this section, the functional failure of investigated pipe evalu-
ated using obtained stress components from FEA. The functional
failure mainly happens due to matrix cracking and then fluid
weeps through the wall of the structure. Hence fluid leakage and
formation of liquid droplets on the exterior surface of pipe are
signs of functional failure. Therefore, it would be necessary to iden-
tify the mode of failure in each ply to find the leakage path from
innermost layer to the outermost layer. For this purpose, two sets
of stress-based failure criteria, namely as maximum stress [14] and
Hashin [18] failure criteria are examined.
Several methods have been suggested to estimate the strength
components in FRP layers. One of the simple methods presented
in below formulation estimates strength components using the
strengths of the resin and roving as per Table 1. These formulations
will be accurate enough for the purpose of this study:
 
Em
XT ¼ Xf V f þ V m ð5Þ
Ef
X C ¼ 0:5X T ð6Þ
Y T ¼ V mXm ð7Þ
Y C ¼ V m X 0m ð8Þ
where XT, XC, YT and YC are representative of longitudinal tensile
strength, longitudinal compressive strength, transverse tensile
strength, transverse compressive strength and Xf, Xm and X 0m stands
for fiber tensile strength, matrix tensile strength, matrix compres-
sive strength, respectively. The in-plane shear strength is also
selected as 65 MPa for all cases as an average of shear strength
for unidirectional FRP layers with different fiber volume fraction
on the basis of experimental observations. Since the laminates will
experience negligible shear stress in comparison with arisen stress
components in longitudinal and transverse direction, this can be
considered as a rational assumption.
The accuracy of the employed sets of failure criteria in estimat-
ing functional failure for the case of FRP pipes in comparison with
experimental observations will be investigated in the next
sections.
4.4. Degradation rules
The stress components induced in each and every layer
obtained from Section 4.2 are fed into failure criteria introduced
in Section 4.3. If failure happens in any layer, its mechanical
 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588 583

(a): in-plane longitudinal stress (σx) (b): in-plane transverse stress (σy)

(c): in-plane shear stress (σs) (d): out-of-plane normal stress (σz)

(e): out-of-plane shear stress (σzy)

Fig. 3. Stress distribution for pipes.

properties are reduced based on experienced failure mode using

Table 2 one of the following rules:
Mechanical properties of composite plies in pipes for the verification of FE models.
ðEX ; EY ; m; GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; Y C ; SÞintact
Plies for [±55]2 Plies for [±55]3
! ð0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0Þfailed ð9aÞ
Ex (GPa) 141.6 43.8
Ey (GPa) 10.7 12.5
Ez (GPa) 10.7 12.5 ðEX ; EY ; m; GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; Y C ; SÞintact
Gxy (GPa) 3.57 4.52
Gyz (GPa) 3.88 4.55
! ð0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0Þfailed ð9bÞ
Gxz (GPa) 3.88 4.55
mxy 0.286 0.31 ðEX ; EY ; m; GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; Y C ; SÞintact
mxz 0.495 0.38
myz 0.495 0.38 ! ðEX ; 0:1EY ; 0:1m; 0:1GXY ; X T ; X C ; 0; Y C ; SÞfailed ð9cÞ
584 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588

280 A computer code was written in MatLab to execute the whole

explained procedures in Sections 4.1–4.4 in an integrated modeling
260
procedure. The code employs written macro in ANSYS for stress
Hoop and axial stress (MPa)

240 analysis and the output are fed into the next step for further anal-
220 σθ, Analytical Sol. ysis. Fig. 6 presents the flowchart of modeling procedure.
σθ, FEM
200 σz, Analytical Sol.
σz, FEM
5. Model validation
180

160 The developed code is executed for the specific wall construc-
tion of the pipe introduced in experimental section. Fig. 7 presents
140 first-ply failure pressure for the pipe versus different volume frac-
120 tions using both maximum stress and Hashin failure criteria and
both material properties formulations as modified rule of mix-
100
49.5 50.0 50.5 51.0 51.5 52.0 52.5 ture/Chamis and Halpin–Tsai.
Since the failure mode of the first ply failure is identified as
Radius (mm)
matrix cracking, it can be seen that by increasing fiber volume frac-
Fig. 4. Hoop and axial stresses obtained from FEM and analytical method for tion, the pressure associated with FPF decreases. Fig. 8 shows the
closed–closed ends composite. functional failure pressure for investigated pipe versus fiber vol-
ume fractions on the basis of both maximum stress and Hashin
failure criteria. Both Halpin–Tsai and modified ROM rules have
140 been also employed for the sake of comparison. It can be observed
120
from this figure that regardless of the formulation used for calcu-
Hoop and axial stress (MPa)

lating material properties, failure pressures predicted by maxi-

100 mum stress criterion are higher than that of obtained by Hashin
failure criteria.
80 σθ, Analytical Sol. As it can be seen, the application of modified ROM for calculat-
σθ, FEM
60 ing transverse Young’s modulus of laminates will lead us to lower
σz, Analytical Sol.
FPF pressure in comparison with the values obtained using Halpin–
σz, FEM
40 Tsai method. The opposite behavior can be seen for the case of FF
pressures. On the other hand, the obtained pressures for FPF and
20
FF are very close when Halpin–Tsai formulation is used. Namely,
0

-20
29.5 30.0 30.5 31.0 31.5 32.0 32.5 33.0
Radius (mm)

Fig. 5. Hoop and axial stresses obtained from FEM and analytical method for
closed–free ends composite pipe.

ðEX ; EY ; m; GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; Y C ; SÞintact

! ðEX ; 0:1EY ; 0:1m; 0:1GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; 0; SÞfailed ð9dÞ

ðEX ; EY ; m; GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; Y C ; SÞintact

! ðEX ; 0:1EY ; 0:1m; 0:1GXY ; X T ; X C ; Y T ; 0; SÞfailed ð9eÞ

Eqs. (9a) and (9b) deal with fiber tension and compression modes of
failure; while Eqs. (9c) and (9d) are associated with matrix tension
and matrix compression and Eq. (9e) corresponds with fiber/matrix
shearing modes of failure in FRP plies. The applicability of the afore-
mentioned degradation rules have been previous studied by Rafiee
[13] for obtaining hoop tensile strength of FRP pipes.

4.5. Progressive modeling

In order to study the functional failure of FRP pipe, the internal

hydrostatic pressure is increased incrementally. The on-axis stress
components are obtained using FEA in each increment and occur-
rence of the failure is examined, accordingly. If the failure is not
experienced, the internal pressure increases as the next increment
and if it happens, the mechanical properties are reduced using
appropriate degradation rules. The procedure continues till the
whole plies are failed and weepage is identified in all constructing
layers. Fig. 6. Flowchart of developed code for failure analysis.
 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588 585

2.4 good agreement with experimentally measured pressure of

Max stress, Halpin-Tsai
Max stress, modified ROM
2.5 MPa. The main reason that the developed modeling procedure
2.2
First-ply failure pressure (MPa)

Hashin, Halpin-Tsai underestimates functional failure pressure can be justified by this

Hashin, modified ROM
2.0
fact that the developed modeling procedure neglects the inner
liner explained in experimental study section. During the modeling
1.8 procedure no catastrophic failure is reported in laminates (fiber
tension/compression mode of failure) and matrix cracking and
1.6 shearing modes of failure are observed. This implies on the func-
1.4 tional failure of investigated pipe instead of structural failure. Dif-
ferent combinations of micromechanics rules presented in
1.2 Section 4.1 and failure criteria presented in Section 4.3 are
employed for the analysis and it is revealed that modified ROM
1.0
for transverse Young’s modulus and Chamis formulation for in-
0.8 plane shear modulus in combination with Hashin failure criteria
48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 will lead us to the best agreed results with experimental data.
Vf (%) Table 4 presents the pressure values associated with first-ply
failure (FPF) and functional failure (FF) for both methods of calcu-
Fig. 7. First-ply failure pressure for the investigated pipe versus fiber volume lating material properties when Hashin failure criteria are
fraction. employed.
It can be inferred from presented results in Table 4 that when
Halpin–Tsai formulations are employed for computing mechanical
6 properties, the predicted FPP pressure and FF pressure are almost
Functional Failure Pressure (MPa)

5
4 sonable damage progression can be seen among all layers when
3
2 FPF occurrence.
1 formed in order to validate the developed code with the
48 50 52 54
Vf (%)
Fig. 8. The functional failure pressure for the investigated FRP pipe versus fiber
volume fraction.
all of the layers experience matrix cracking or shear failure almost
immediately after the occurrence of FPF.
Developed modeling procedure is executed to obtain the inter-
nal pressure associated with the functional failure of investigated
FRP pipe in experimental study (fiber volume fraction of 56.63%).
It is observed that the first ply failure occurs at the pressure of
1.08 MPa in the first laminate experiencing matrix cracking mode
of failure. Distribution of in-plane stress components at this pres-
sure in all layers are reported in Table 3.
The modeling continues till all plies are failed due to matrix
cracking which is representative of a weepage throughout the
whole plies. The obtained pressure is 2.42 MPa which is in a very
Table 3
Stress distribution in FRP pipe subjected to 1.08 MPa internal pressure (MROM).
Layer number Stress components (MPa)
rx
1 361.76
2 103.17
3 102.83
4 102.49
5 102.14
6 101.82
7 101.46
Hashin- Halpin-Tsai
Hashin- modified ROM the same, namely no tangible damage evolution in layers can be
Max stress- Halpin-Tsai seen. On the other hand, this method is underestimating FF pres-
Max stress-modified ROM
sure in comparison with experimental results and its conservative
trend will be led to uneconomical pipe design. In contrast, a rea-
modified ROM and Chamis formulations are used for transverse
and in-plane shear moduli, respectively. This strategy clearly
shows the very important benefit of layered composite structures
that the structure can still accommodate loading in spite of the
In addition to the specific wall construction of the pipe investi-
gated in experimental section, another numerical study is per-
56 58 60 62 experimental results published in literature [12]. For this purpose,
the code is executed for two pipe configurations with stacking
sequences of [±55]4 and [±75]4 with similar boundary conditions
of 1H:0A and functional failure pressure are evaluated. The func-
tional failure pressures from numerical analysis are obtained as
9.54 and 7.64 MPa, respectively. These values are in a very good
agreement with experimentally measured pressures reported in
[12] as 10.3 and 8.48, respectively.
6. Parametric study
The fiber volume fraction and winding angle of cross plies play
the most important role in mechanical behavior of FRP pipes influ-
encing the functional failure pressures. From theoretical point of
view, the inevitable effect of fiber volume fractions on mechanical
properties and strengths of plies is obvious from micromechanics
rules. Moreover, the fiber volume fractions will also affect the
thickness of ply which can be traced in Eqs. (1) and (2). For exam-
ple, for the mechanical properties which were mentioned earlier in
Table 1, when fiber volume fraction decreases from 0.55 to 0.5, the
tensile strength of the lamina is reduced approximately 9% which
is a significant drop. On the other hand, winding angle has a direct
ry rs effect on thickness of cross plies. But more importantly, the wind-
ing angle will severely influence the stress distribution in a lamina
55.08 0.0007
11.75 22.84
influencing failure occurrence. Consequently, a parametric study is
11.81 22.83 carried out in this section to realize the influence of these param-
11.87 22.81 eters on the corresponding pressures to the first ply and functional
11.93 22.79 failures.
12.00 22.78
The volume fraction of the fiber in FRP pipes produced by fila-
12.05 22.76
ment winding technology is more often placed between 50% and
586 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588

Table 4
A comparison between modified ROM and Halpin–Tsai methods for predicting FPF and FF.

Lay-up configuration Fiber volume fraction = 56.63%

FPF pressure (MPa) FF pressure (MPa)
Halpin–Tsai Modified ROM and Chamis Halpin–Tsai Modified ROM and Chamis
[90/±52.53] 1.77 1.08 1.78 2.42
[90/±57.53] 2.06 1.33 2.08 2.35
[90/±60.193] 2.26 1.56 2.28 2.5

60%, practically. So, five different fiber volume fractions of 50%, 3.8
52.5%, 55%, 57.5% and 60% are chosen for the investigated pipe. [90/±52.5 3]
The most frequent winding angles pertinent to the cross plies are

Thickness of FRP pipe (mm)

[90/±57.5 3]

identified as 52.5°, 57.5° and 60.19°. Keeping the fiber volume frac- 3.6 [90/±60.19 3]

tion as a constant value of 50% in this section, the influence of

aforementioned winding angles on the failure of FRP pipes is stud-
ied. Fig. 9 presents the first-ply failure and functional failure pres-
sures for various fiber volume fractions and winding angles based
on using Halpin–Tsai and modified rule of mixture formulations for
obtaining transverse mechanical properties; while Hashin failure
criteria are used in both cases.
It can be seen from Fig. 9 that the first-ply failure and functional
failure pressures decrease when the fiber volume fraction
increases. This trend can be justified by analyzing three parameters
as ply thickness, transverse modulus and strength of laminates.
When the fiber volume fraction increases, the thickness of plies
reduced considerably according to Eqs. (1) and (2). Consequently,
the induced off-axis stress in the ply increases. The monotonic
decreasing trend of the ply thickness with respect to the fiber vol-
ume fraction is depicted in Fig. 10.
It is observed that in all cases the experienced mode of failure
for FPF is matrix cracking. Increasing fiber volume fraction not only
reduces the in-plane transverse strength (YT which is described by
Eq. (14)); but also increases the transverse Young’s modulus of a
ply. This will be resulted in monotonic decreasing trend of FPF
and FF pressures, due to the important role of transverse tensile
strength and transverse compressive strength in Hashin failure cri-
teria (Eqs. (9b) and (9c)). Fig. 11 shows the variation of transverse
stress components in the most critical layer leading to the FPF
when the pipe is subjected to 1 MPa internal pressure. As it can
be seen from the results, compressive stress happens in all investi-
gated winding angles.
As it can be seen from Fig. 9, the functional failure pressure also
depends inversely to the fiber volume fraction. This is originated
from the same justifications regarding ply thickness, transverse
3.4
3.2
3.0
2.8
0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62
Vf (%)
Fig. 10. The thickness of FRP pipe versus the fiber volume fractions.
stress and strength presented for the FPF pressure trend versus
fiber volume fraction. It can be concluded that although higher
fiber volume fractions improve the overall strength of the FRP
pipes in different directions and actually implies on the reinforcing
pipes against structural failure phenomenon, it has a negative side
effect on decreasing associated functional failure pressures. In
other word, increasing fiber volume fraction will prevent the struc-
tural failure, but the pipe becomes more susceptible to the func-
tional failure.
More detailed study is conducted on the in-plane stress distri-
butions with respect to the winding angle and obtained results
are illustrated in Fig. 12. It can be seen that increasing winding
angle considerably improves the functional failure pressure. The
transverse stress component which is the main role player in defin-
ing functional failure behavior shows a decreasing behavior while

3.0 4
FPF, [90/±52.5 3] FPF, [90/±52.5 3]
FF, [90/±52.53 3] FF, [90/±52.53 3]
2.8
FPF and FF Pressure (MPa)

FPF and FF Pressure (MPa)

FPF, [90/±57.5 3] FPF, [90/±57.5 3]

FF, [90/±57.5 3] FF, [90/±57.5 3]
2.6 FPF, [90/±60.19 3] 3 FPF, [90/±60.19 3]
FF, [90/±60.19 3] FF, [90/±60.19 3]
2.4

2.2
2
2.0

1.8
1
1.6

0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62 0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62
Vf (%) Vf (%)

Fig. 9. Variation of first-ply failure pressures versus fiber volume fraction for different values of winding angles using Halpin–Tsai (left) and modified ROM (right).
 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588 587

-43.0 -50

-43.5 [90/±52.5 3]
[90/±57.5 3]
-52

Transverse Stress (MPa)

Transverse Stress (MPa)

[90/±60.19 3]
-44.0
-54
-44.5 [90/±52.5 3]
-56 [90/±57.5 3]
-45.0 [90/±60.19 3]
-58
-45.5
-60
-46.0

-46.5 -62

-47.0 -64
0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62 0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62
Vf (%) Vf (%)

Fig. 11. The variation of transverse stress versus fiber volume fraction using Halpin–Tsai (left) and modified ROM (right).

the higher stress is induced along fiber direction. This stems from axial strength of the pipes in the safe region. The same value was
this fact that by increasing winding angle which is measured from also reported by a simple netting analysis [19].
longitudinal axis of the pipe, the circumferential reinforcement of It can be interpreted from the presented results in Figs 9 and 12
the pipe will be more improved more significantly in comparison that the influence of a winding angle on the functional failure pres-
with its longitudinal reinforcement. Despite the fact that higher sure is more pronounced that of a fiber volume fraction. It is highly
winding angles will be led to higher functional failure pressures, important to note that while higher values of fiber volume frac-
but it will reduce the axial strength of the pipe which is another tions are required for structural behavior and strength of the pipes,
design constraint from installation point of view. It can be said its negative side effect on decreasing functional failure pressures
qualitatively that winding angles around 55° is an appropriate of FRP pipes can be overcome by increasing winding angles of
winding angle for keeping both functional failure pressure and also angle plies.

140 8
(a) [90/±52.5 3] (b)
130 [90/±57.5 3]
6
Longitudinal Stress (MPa)

[90/±60.19 3]
Transverse Stress (MPa)

120
4 [90/±52.5 3]
[90/±57.5 3]
110 [90/±60.19 3]
2
100
0
90

-2
80

70 -4
0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62 0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62
Vf (%) Vf (%)

-20
(c) [90/±52.53]
-22 [90/±57.53]
[90/±60.193]
-24
Shear Stress (MPa)

-26

-28

-30

-32

-34

-36

-38
0.48 0.50 0.52 0.54 0.56 0.58 0.60 0.62
Vf (%)

Fig. 12. In-plane stress distribution versus fiber volume fractions for different winding angles (based on Halpin–Tsai formulation and for the first angle ply after hoop ply).
588 R. Rafiee, A. Amini / Computational Materials Science 96 (2015) 579–588

Table 5
Sequence of failure in different plies of a FRP pipe with lay-up configuration of [90/±52.53].

Ply number/angle Mode of failure Internal hydrostatic pressure (MPa) Induced in-plane stress components (MPa)
rx ry rs
1 (90°) Matrix cracking 1.08 364.77 56.44 0.0007
1 (90°) Shear failure 1.64 579.46 50.7 0.0005
7 (52.5°) Matrix cracking 2.41 217.31 32.79 52.9
2 (52.5°) Matrix cracking 2.42 221.28 38.26 56.34
3 (52.5°) Matrix cracking 2.42 217.44 37.9 56.35
4 (52.5°) Matrix cracking 2.42 219.68 38.56 56.26
5 (52.5°) Matrix cracking 2.42 215.79 38.19 56.28
6 (52.5°) Matrix cracking 2.43 175.6 71 69

The trend of progressive modeling and experienced modes of
failure in different plies are studied and detailed results are
inserted in Table 5.
It can be seen that the associated modes of failure with FPF can
be appeared in the form of either matrix cracking or shear failure
depending on the winding angles.
7. Conclusions
The mechanical behavior of composite pipes produced by fila-
ment winding method is studied from failure viewpoint when it
is subjected to internal hydrostatic pressure. A progressive damage
modeling is developed to obtain the internal pressure associated
with functional failure implying on a non-structural failure that
pipe can still support the loading, but it cannot sustain its mission
anymore. The functional failure is practically identified as weepage
or leakage while the fluid finds a path throughout the pipe wall
thickness. Since the structural failure happens in higher pressures
than that of functional failure, predicting functional failure pres-
sure is of great importance in design procedure of FRP pipes. The
developed progressive damage modeling consists of four main
parts of model preparation, stress analysis, failure evaluation and
material degradation. Different micromechanics rules for predict-
ing mechanical properties of the composite layers as the output
of model preparation and input of stress analysis are evaluated
in combination with two different failure criteria. It is observed
that employing improved rule of mixture and Chamis formulations
for predicting transverse Young’s modulus and in-plane shear
modulus in combination with Hashin failure criteria will be
resulted in a very good agreement between theoretical modeling
and experimental data. For the specific wall construction of inves-
tigated pipe in experimental section, a relative difference of 3.2% is
reported between the obtained pressure by developed code and
experimentally measured data.
After validating the developed modeling procedure, a paramet-
ric study is conducted to investigate the influence of fiber volume
fractions and winding angles on the functional failure pressure. It is
observed that although increasing fiber volume fractions improve
the overall strength of the FRP pipes in different directions, it has
a negative side effect on decreasing associated functional failure
pressures. This is arisen from this fact that increasing fiber volume
fractions will decrease matrix volume fraction and this will be led
to the reduction in transverse strength of the laminate which is
responsible for the matrix cracking mode of failure. Matrix
cracking mode of failure is the dominant mode of failure for func-
tional failure of the FRP pipes.
It is observed that for a winding angle of 52.5, increasing fiber
volume fraction from 50% to 60% will be led to the 22% reduction
in the functional failure. This amount of reduction in functional
failure is reported to be 30% and 27.5% for the winding angles of
57.5 and 60.19 respectively.
On the other hand, it is revealed that increasing winding angle
(measured from pipe axial direction) significantly enhances the
functional failure pressure. The transverse stress component which
is the main role player in defining functional failure behavior
shows a decreasing behavior with respect to the winding angles
while the higher stress is induced along fiber direction. For
instance, increasing winding angle from 52.5 to 60.19 will increase
the functional failure pressure 6.7% at the fiber volume fraction of
50%.
Consequently the negative effect of higher values of fiber vol-
ume fractions on the functional failure of the pipe can be overcome
by proper selection of winding angles for cross plies in the pipe
wall construction which is an important and useful finding for
FRP pipe design procedure.
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