Failure analysis of composite tube hinge and optimization design

Abstract Composite materials with intriguing mechanical properties are introduced into special deployable structure. The tube hinge in this research is investigated, which has a base tube structure with one slot. However, due to large rotation and large nonlinearity, the composite tube hinge has material failure, thus leading to deployment failure. To overcome the problem, Hashin failure criterion is used for checking the extent to which the material is damaged in folding processes. The optimal model is established base on response surface methodology, which aimed at maximizing the strain energy and minimizing the peak moment to ensure full deployment stably. The failure index during folding processes are subjected (less than 1) to avoid material damage. The length of slot L, width of slot D, diameter R and thickness T of tube hinge are chosen as the design variables. Using the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm, the optimum parameters are obtained by solving the multi-objective optimal model. The proposed method has significance on designing novel deployable structures with high stability and reliability.