Predicting failure in composite laminates: The background to the exercise

This Special Edition of Composites Science and Technology is dedicated to the subject of failure theories for continuous fibre-reinforced-polymer composite materials (FRPs). The papers were commissioned as a co-ordinated study (referred to as the failure exercise') aimed at providing a comprehensive description of the foremost failure theories available at the present time, a comparison of their predictive capabilities directly with each other, and a comparison of their predictive capabilities against experimental data. This introductory paper sets the scene for the failure exercise', describing the process by which the participants were selected, the general instructions supplied to each participant and the format for presenting the output of the work. (C) British Crown Copyright 1998, Defence Evaluation and Research Agency, published by Elsevier Science Ltd with permission.