Sublaminates and Laminates

• Before we look at a more complex laminate case it is important to learn about sublaminates and laminates in CMAP.
• Typical laminates are made up of repeat structures within each laminate and as well as through the thickness of the full structure.
• CMAP allows the user to build up to 5 unique sublaminates which can be used to make a large laminate comprising some or all of these sublaminates.
• The assembled laminate on the top right is made up of sublaminate 1 and 2 with a structural stacking sequence of 1,2,1,2,1.
• The laminate on the bottom right uses the same sublaminates to build a more complex laminate structure.
• The time to build laminates is greatly reduced using this design methodology. It also allows the user to easily design and analyze composite structures on the fly.

New Sublaminate

• Up to now we have essentially being working with sublaminate 1 being our entire laminate structure.
• Click on the Geometry Tab. In the sublaminate section you will see Current = 1 . This corresponds to sublaminate 1 which is populated with our [0 ° /90 ° ] 3S laminate.
• Lets now make a new sublaminate buy making Current = 2 . The table is now empty. Let's make a quasi-isotropic laminate using our workbench and populate this table. (You have not lost the [0 ° /90 ° ] 3S laminate information, it is saved in memory).
• Let us make a 0.25 inch [0/90/+45/-45] 2S by filling out the following information. Set Tot. Thickness = 0.25 , no. of plies = 16 and click Send to Workbench and SL .
• Note that this just sends thickness information. We now need to fill out the remaining ply information. In the repeat unit layup area, set size = 4 . (Have you noticed how size data options automatically changes to fit evenly into the laminate being built). Let's make it all carbon by setting Mat ID = 2 in the top left cell. Now hit the Fill button. Change the angle of each ply to 0,90,+45,-45 . Click the Send to Sublam button to populate sublaminate 2. Click on the Symmetric button in the Sublaminate section to make this laminate symmetric.
• We have now made a new sublaminate. Let's now incorporate this into a larger structure with sublaminate 1.

(Click on the image for bigger picture)