In‐plane shear damage behaviours of 2D needled C/SiC composites

Understanding the in‐plane shear behaviour of composites is essential to establish the design basis for practical applications. This study aims to investigate the shear damage behaviours of 2D needled C/SiC composites by various characterization techniques. The effect of layer arrangement on shear modulus and strength was discussed via shear stress‐strain responses. The shear strain field evolution and uniformity variation were studied by digital image correlation. It shows that the uniformity of shear strain field changes with the shear load, and the shear strain field evolution consist of 5 stages. The electrical resistivity measurement results indicate that structural deformation and damage evolution caused the electrical resistivity change. Furthermore, the damage evolution has a double effect on the electrical resistivity variation. The acoustic emission monitoring shows that the shear damage evolution is a 3‐stage nonlinear process before failure. The shear damages were categorized via acoustic characteristics. Besides, the postfailure behaviours were also discussed in this study.