An Experimental Method to Produce Uniform Plane Stress States with Application to Fiber Reinforced Materials.

Abstract : This work is concerned with a new method for testing material properties under uniform plane stress conditions by means of specially designed plane specimen. Photoelastic analysis showed that in the significant section of the specimen it is possible to produce uniform plane stress with high accuracy subject to the limitation that the principal stresses are of different signs. An important special case of loading produces shear on the significant section. The method is of particular importance for fiber composite testing. Preliminary experimental results presented are encouraging. (Author)