Impact damage evolution of 3D spacer woven composites with tailored core cell geometries and face sheet architectures

This study aims to enhance the impact damage resistance of 3D spacer woven composites. The novelty of this study is tailoring both core cell geometry and face sheet architecture of 3D spacer woven composites. The 3D square spacer composites exhibited superior impact resistance compared to the 3D triangular spacer composites at both 20 J and 40 J energy levels. This behaviour was attributed to the increased resilience and more flexible response of the 3D square spacer core structure. The impact resistance of the 3D spacer composites also increased with the reinforcement of 2D woven composites. The lowest deformation was achieved for the composites reinforced with satin 2D woven composites, which was related to the higher stiffness provided by the low-crimp satin weave under impact load, compared to the plain and twill weaves.