Targeting Composite Wing Performance – Optimising the

Composite Lay-Up Design

Sam Patten
Optimisation Specialist, Altair Engineering Ltd
Imperial House, Holly Walk, Royal Leamington Spa, CV32 4JG
sam.patten@uk.altair.com

Abstract
This paper demonstrates the application of innovative optimisation functionality
within Altair HyperWorks for the design of optimised composite structures.

In the field of composite design there are an almost unlimited number of ways in which a
laminate could be constructed by modifying the laminate ply shapes, position, orientation,
material and lay-up sequence. With such a range of possibilities determining the optimum
design has previously been extremely time-consuming and traditional optimisation methods
cannot cope with problems of this scale and complexity. The development of Altair’s
composite optimisation technology has made it not only possible to optimise complex
composite structures but also complete the optimisation in a short time frame.

This paper shows how Altair OptiStruct, part of the HyperWorks suite, is used to provide a
complete solution when designing with laminated composites, taking the design through
concept stages to producing the final ply lay-up sequence. The technology is applied to the
design of a laminated wing cover to produce a mass optimised design which meets the
requested structural targets.

Keywords: Laminate Boundaries, OptiStruct, Free Element Sizing

1.0 Introduction
The aerospace industry provides many challenges which require the use of leading edge
technologies to keep up with increasing performance demands. This paper shows how
Altair’s optimisation technology can be applied to the design of composite wing covers to
provide a detailed composite design and to determine:

i. Patch shape & position

ii. Number of plies for each shape, position & orientation
iii. Ply stacking sequence

In determining the optimum composite design, the following structural & manufacturability
targets were applied to the structure:

i. Stiffness targets
ii. Laminate lay-up rules

The laminate lay-up rules to be applied are:

i. The final design must have 45°/-45° layers on the outside

ii. The lay-up must be symmetric
iii. The 45° & -45° layers must be balanced
© Altair Engineering 2009 16-1
 iv. The lay-up must not have more than four plies of the same orientation adjacent to
each other

The OptiStruct optimisation process involved using:

 Free Element Sizing (FES) optimisation was used to determine the ply shapes &
positions (concept design phase)
 Size optimisation was used to determine the required number of plies for each
ply patch & orientation (system level design phase)
 Stacking sequence optimisation was used to determine the best lay-up
sequence subject to meeting the composite stacking rules (detailed design
phase)

2.0 Free Element Sizing

2.1 FES Modelling method

An existing finite element model of the aircraft wing was provided, containing a number of in
flight, take-off and landing loading conditions. Structural targets were also provided for
each loading condition:

 Static displacements at the wing tip

 Rotational stiffness targets

The objectives of the free element size optimisation are to:

i. Produce concept ply shapes for upper and lower covers of the aircraft wing
ii. Save significant model set-up & run time compared to other optimisation
methods
iii. Visualise which ply orientations are doing the most work
iv. Minimise the mass of the composite covers
v. Meet the required stiffness targets

2.2 Free Element Sizing Method & Super-Ply Concepts

Free element sizing allows the thicknesses of individual shell elements to be varied
independently. In the case of composite structures, the thicknesses of each ply within each
element are varied independently. The method is based upon similar principles to topology
optimisation, as opposed to having actual independent design variables for each element
thickness. This has the following advantages:

i. Ease of model setup; one option to vary all elements independently within the
model
ii. Single design variable per component; independent thickness changes handled
internally
iii. Fast solution time; converges in few iterations

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-2

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 T0
°
0°
90°
T-
45°
45°
-45°
PCOM
P

Figure 1: Free Element Sizing

The concept of a “super-ply” is to group plies of the same type together such that the
number of plies in the model is significantly reduced. The thickness of each super-ply can
then be varied as a method of simulating addition or removal of plies in the laminate.
OptiStruct allows an element formulation to be used which smears the available stiffness
from the plies uniformly throughout the element thickness. This is similar to dividing each
ply into a number of infinitely thin plies and mixing them evenly, allowing the composite to
be modelled as a super-ply but simulated as if it were a uniformly shuffled stack, ignoring
the effects of ply position with the lay-up.

Ply Level Stack Super-Ply Stack Smear Formulation

(layers uniformly mixed)
Figure 2: Super-Ply Methodology

Since the element thicknesses are varied independently, the solution has the benefit of
highlighting the optimum location for laminate patches as well as their thickness. Optimised
(concept) ply shapes are automatically generated as a part of the optimisation solution.

3.0 Concept Design Phase

3.1 Modelling method

The elements in the upper and lower cover were arranged into a new component group and
assigned a super-ply property. The laminate is made up of four super-ply layers (0°, 45°,-
45°, 90°) each of which has an orthotropic material definition. The orthotropic material zero
direction was aligned with the wing length and has a longitudinal stiffness that is
significantly higher than the transverse stiffness (E1 >> E2).

The super-ply uses the SMEAR option to simulate an evenly shuffled laminate stack. This
property was used by the free element size optimisation to determine the optimum
thicknesses of each element in each of the four plies. This gives the optimisation a large
amount of flexibility in producing an optimum design as it has the potential to vary 11282
thickness vales, equivalent to the number of elements in Free Size component multiplied by
© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-3
Optimising the composite lay-up design
the number of independent composite layers. The composite stack is simulated as being
symmetric, using the SYSMEAR formulation.

90°

45°

0°

Figure 3: Optimisation Model

The composite covers included in the optimisation are shown below in Figure 4.

Figure 4: Wing Covers for Optimisation

The design requires that the number and positioning of the 45º and the -45º layers must be
identical. This is to make sure the laminate remains symmetrical throughout all design
phases and to minimise the likelihood of introducing manufacturing stresses, such as
torsion. An optimisation constraint was applied to link the +45º and -45º layers, ensuring
that they produce the same ply shapes.

In order to meet all the design targets in the final stages of the optimisation, a number of
additional composite constraints were applied to the Free Element Size study:

i. Maximum & minimum total laminate thickness to prevent very thick areas occurring
& to redistribute the material accordingly
ii. Minimum thicknesses for the 45° & -45° layers to ensure material is retained for
outer cover layers
iii. Maximum & minimum ply percentages to ensure enough different ply orientations
are available to meet lay-up sequence rules
iv. Enforce the optimiser filter out very small (unrealistic) ply shapes

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-4

Optimising the composite lay-up design
The free element sizing optimisation study is set up as follows:

Design variables:
 Thickness of each ply within each element in the 0º, 45º & 90º layers in the
upper and lower composite wing covers
 -45º layer thickness is linked to the 45º layer thickness

Objective:
 Minimise the mass of the laminate covers

Design constraints:
 Achieve the required bending and torsional stiffness for all of the loading
conditions, defined as the wing tip displacement targets
 Laminate thickness constraints
 Ply percentage constraints
 Minimum ply thickness constraints
 Minimum patch size constraints

3.2 OptiStruct FES Optimisation Results

A FES optimisation was completed to calculate the thicknesses for each of the four ply
orientations, giving the minimum mass whilst achieving the stiffness targets. The +45º and -
45º degree layers were linked such that their resulting thicknesses are identical. The
optimised thicknesses for each of the ply layers are shown below:

Figure 5: Ply Thickness Results from Free Element Sizing Optimisation

(0º left; 45º/-45º middle; 90º right)

The optimization took approximately fifteen minutes on a Windows desktop and converged
in 38 iterations, requiring only 334Mb of memory. The set-up time for the optimisation study
is also minimal; a few minutes.

The results show that the 0º ply requires the highest number of layers. This is because the
0º ply is doing the most work being orientated in the direction of the load path. The 45º & -
45º layers are identical, meeting the manufacturing requirement, and show that a number of
45º /-45º layers are required in the centre of the covers.
The 90º ply, being orientated out of plane to the loading, is not being worked and
consequently requires very few layers.

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-5

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 Figure 6: Element Thickness Results from Free Element Sizing Optimisation

The thickness is maintained at leading & trailing edge of the wing centralised region,
providing torsional stiffness as well as bending stiffness. The thickness is reduced as much
as possible in other regions to minimise the mass.

At the end of the Free Element Sizing optimisation, OptiStruct automatically generates ply
shapes based upon the optimisation results. For each ply orientation, the optimised ply
thickness is split into a number of layers of different shapes, the default being 4 shapes per
orientation.

Figure 7: Automatically Generated Ply Shapes

The ply shapes that were generated by OptiStruct were edited using HyperMesh. This
allows the shape of the plies to be based around the optimisation results but also be made
realistic & manufacturable. Any infeasible ply shapes can be removed and shapes which
are too complicated can be simplified. This process was completed for each of the layers
that were generated automatically, producing a total of 62 ply shapes.

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-6

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 Figure 8: Ply Shapes Modified Using HyperMesh

For each ply shape, four plies were created with material orientations 0°, 45°,-45° and 90°
producing a total of 248 available ply types. These plies will be used in the system level
optimisation when determining how many plies are needed.

4.0 System Design Phase

4.1 Size optimisation

In order to determine how many plies are required for each ply shape and orientation, size
optimisation can be used. This will tune the thicknesses of the different plies in discrete
levels as a simulation of adding & removing plies in the laminate lay-up. Consequently when
using this method, the ply shapes are fixed and the thicknesses of all elements within a ply
are varied being together as a group.

T0
°
0°
90°
T-
45°
45°
-45°
PCOM
P

Figure 9: Ply Thickness Optimisation

Whilst carrying out composite sizing optimisation it is possible to impose any combination of
the following laminate constraints, if required:

 Maximum & minimum total laminate thickness

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-7
Optimising the composite lay-up design
  Maximum & minimum ply thickness
 Maximum & minimum ply percentages
 Non designable plies within a stack
 Linking thicknesses of different ply orientations

4.2 System level optimisation

The size optimisation method was applied to the wing covers to determine the required
number of plies to meet the bending and torsional stiffness targets. A thickness design
variable was assigned to each ply within the top & bottom covers resulting in a total of 248
design variables. The thickness design variables were discrete, only allowing changes in
increments of a single ply thickness. The design variables for the 45° & -45° orientated plies
were linked such that they would produce a design with the same number of 45° and -45°
orientated plies. The objective for the optimisation was to minimise the mass. In addition to
this a number of ply constraints were added:

• Maximum & minimum total laminate thickness, to prevent large changes in thickness
• Minimum ply thickness for 45°/-45° to ensure that plies are retained for the outer
layers of the covers
• Maximum & minimum ply percentages to ensure enough plies are retained to meet
stacking rules in the final optimisation

The setup was performed using HyperMesh & submitted to OptiStruct for optimisation.
During the study, each ply thickness is tuned to meet structural requirements and any
unneeded plies are removed by reducing their thickness to zero. The optimisation took 11
iterations and 331 Mb of memory on a Windows desktop. The run time for the solution was
11 minutes.

The thicknesses of the optimised covers are shown below. Material is retained in similar
areas to the regions determined by FES; however the plies that are used have all been
designed to be manufacturable.

Figure 10: Total Thickness After Size Optimisation

Of the 62 ply shapes available in the study, 59 have been retained. The other 3 have been
automatically removed by having their thicknesses tuned to zero.

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-8

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 Figure 11: Removed Ply Shape (left); Optimised Ply Thickness (right)

After completing the optimisation, OptiStruct automatically creates physical plies for the
detailed design stage of the optimisation. This is achieved by dividing the optimised
thickness by the discrete step size (thickness of a single ply) to determine the number of
physical plies to create.

The sizing optimisation automatically generated a new model which contained:

 174 plies with 0° orientation

 57 plies with 45° orientation
 57 plies with -45° orientation
 53 plies with 90° orientation
 A total 341 ply layers

Figure 12: Optimised Ply Converted into Multiple Plies

The model now has optimum shaped plies and also the number of each ply has been tuned.
To complete the process, it is necessary to also meet the ply lay up rules. This is addressed
in the next phase of the design.

5.0 Detailed Design Phase

5.1 Stack sequence optimisation

When orthotropic materials are used, the part properties can be adjusted by changing the
order of the plies within the laminate. This technique is known to produce changes to the
structural performance such as:

 Bending and torsional stiffness

 Buckling factors
 Stresses, strains and reserve factors

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-9

Optimising the composite lay-up design
To take advantage of this, OptiStruct can perform a laminate stack sequence optimisation to
find the best lay-up sequence whilst meeting a combination of ply lay-up rules.

90 0
45 45
-45 -45
0 90
0 90
-45 -45
45 45
90 0

Figure 13: Plies Automatically Reordered to Improve Structural Performance

5.2 Stack sequence optimisation set-up

The objective of the optimisation is to reorder the plies to maximise performance

characteristics. This will be achieved by minimising the weighted compliance of the model
across all the load cases.

The setup is carried out by adding two stack sequence design variables (DSHUFFLE) to the
model. The following ply stacking rules were applied for damage tolerance and resistance to
de-lamination:

 Cover; 45°/-45°
 Maximum number of successive plies; 4

The stacking sequence rules that were applied are shown in the images below.

45
-45
0
0
90
COVER: 45,-45
90
0
0
-45
45

Figure 14: Ply Sequence Enforced on Outside of Laminate

The COVER option is applied to enforce the outer plies to use a predefined sequence, such
that ply shuffling will only occur on the internal plies.

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-10

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 45 45

-45 -45

0 0

0 0

0 0

0 90

0 0

0 0

90 0

90 90

90 Too many 90

90 adjacent plies of 0

0 0
same orientation
0 0

0 90

0 0

0 0

0 0

-45 -45

45 45

Figure 15: Ply Sequence Reordered Automatically to Distribute Plies

The maximum successive plies constraint prevents too many plies of the same
configuration from being layered directly together. The plies must be divided by a different
type to improve the laminate integrity.

Additional stacking sequence constraints available in OptiStruct are:

 Pairing; ensure two ply types always occur together within a stack
 Reversed pairing; as pairing but with the order flipped at each occurrence
 Core; a predefined stack sequence at the laminate core

The stacking targets can be used in any combination and can also have weighting factors
applied to assist in determining the best sequence.

5.3 Detailed design results

The stack sequence optimisation converged in 7 analysis iterations, taking 68 minutes on a

Windows desktop. The memory used was 5412mb.

The optimisation history plot (below) shows that the total weighted compliance has been
reduced by reordering the stacking sequence, giving an improvement in structural
performance.

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-11

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 Figure 16: Optimisation History; Compliance Reduced by Modifying Stacking
Sequence

OptiStruct automatically screens the responses for improved efficiency. It is only necessary
to monitor the responses which drive the design. These are written out by default in the
retained responses table. The displacement results for the main retained responses are
shown below. This shows that the final design has stiffness values slightly higher than the
optimisation targets (approx 5%).

Load case Normalised Normalised

displacement target
1 0.94 1.00
2 0.94 1.00
3 0.94 1.00
4 0.94 1.00
5 0.86 1.00
6 0.95 1.00
7 0.94 1.00
8 0.95 1.00
9 0.94 1.00
10 0.95 1.00

Table 1: Final Design Displacement Vs. Targets; Displacement Contours

The stack sequence history throughout the optimisation is written automatically as an HTML
report. This shows the global stack sequence for each of the two covers vs. design iteration.
The plies are coloured orientation, giving an overview of the laminate ply book.

The top cover stack sequence shows some general trends:

 0° plies moved towards the outside of the covers

 90° & -45° plies moved towards centre
 45° plies distributed to break up large ply groups

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-12

Optimising the composite lay-up design
 Optimised Ply
Sequence

Iteration 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Figure 17: Global Stack Sequence (Top Cover)

The optimisation very quickly determines where each ply type is best utilized & then fine
tunes the design to meet the stacking rules; by iteration three, the changes in the stack
sequence appear to be small.

As the plies can have different shapes it is not possible to tell from the global stacking
sequence if the lay up targets have all been met. A more detailed investigation is needed to
see how the lay-up is constructed locally across different regions of wing. This was
achieved using OptiStruct to convert the plies into property regions with the output option
OUTPUT,PCOMP,YES. Elements which have the same layup are grouped together in the
traditional PCOMPG format, allowing a more detailed investigation of the layup in each
region.

Figure 18: Local Property Regions

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-13

Optimising the composite lay-up design
By reviewing the lay-up within each property region, it is possible to show that the lay-up
meets the stack sequencing rules across all localised zones.

For a more detailed review of the layup, a utility was created to convert the shell model into
solids for visualisation purposes. The utility allows thickness scaling and also applies the
element & laminate shell reference plane offsets.

Figure 19: Bottom Wing Cover Solid Visualisation of Plies (Thickness x5)

The solid visualisation makes it possible to see:

 How the plies transition / overlap across different zones

 Thickness drop off
 Manufacturing sequence (ply book)

Also when using a solid visualisation in conjunction with the cross sectioning tools in
HyperView, it is possible to perform a detailed investigation into the layup throughout the
length & width of the covers. Another benefit would be for generating an inner mould
surface for the laminates.

5.4 Discussion of Results

The optimisation studies show that the laminate cover lay-up has a direct effect upon the
global wing bending and torsional stiffness.

The studies have shown that the optimum location for material is at the centralised region of
the leading & trailing edges of the wing. This provides the required torsional as well as
bending stiffness. The thickness should be reduced as much as possible in other regions to
minimise the mass.

The majority of plies should be orientated at 0º to the length of the wing as this is the
direction of the main load path. The other ply orientations (45º,-45º and 90º) are required to
meet the laminate stacking rules and will take any additional (e.g. transverse) loading.

The final design has a stiffness value approximately 5% higher than the minimum allowable.
This suggests that it may be possible to further reduce the mass of the design by removing
© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-14
Optimising the composite lay-up design
a few plies & pushing the stiffness to the design target. This could be achieved by rerunning
the sizing & shuffling phases on the optimised model.

The study was successful in finding a minimum mass design, meeting the stiffness targets
as well as:

 Determining the optimum laminate patch shapes & locations

 Determining required number of plies
 Producing a ply book which meets the stacking rules

To take the design optimisation further, additional design constraints could be included into
the sizing & shuffling phases, such as:

 Stress / strain targets

 Failure index & reserve factor targets

6.0 Conclusions
The study has shown that OptiStruct can be used to produce a very detailed composite
design. The optimised design of the laminate wing covers meets the requested structural
targets, uses the minimum mass and meets ply lay-up rules. The composite tools available
within Altair HyperWorks can be used to take the design from blank sheet to complete ply
book in a very short time frame.

The efficiency of the final design is dependent upon the user’s interpretation of the ply
shapes after free size optimisation. It may be possible to produce a lower mass design by
having additional plies with more detailed ply shapes could but may impact the
manufacturing feasibility, cost & complexity.

A number of areas have been identified in which further research could be performed:

 Include ply strain targets in sizing and shuffling optimisation

 Size effects; thickness and lay-up dependent laminate strain targets
 Iterate the sizing and shuffling optimisation phases to further reduce mass
 Couple composite optimisation with stringer shape changes
 Use a wider set of load cases
 Include ply drop off targets to prevent large changes in thickness across adjacent
elements

7.0 References
[1] ’Optimization Driven design of shell structures under stiffness, strength
and stability requirements’ P Cervellera, M Zhou, U Schramm 6th World
Congresses of Structural and Multidisciplinary Optimization Rio de Janerio 30
May - 03 June 2005 Brazil

[2] ’Targeting Composite Wing Performance – Optimum Location of

Laminate Boundaries’ Marc Funnel, Altair Engineering CAE Technology
Conference 2007

[3] ‘Altair RADIOSS/OptiStruct Version 10.0 Reference Guide’, Altair

Engineering Inc, 2009

© Altair Engineering 2009 Targeting Composite Wing Performance- 16-15

Optimising the composite lay-up design