Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Both experiment and numerical simulation of bird impact on aircraft windshield was
studied. The finite element model of bird impact on the windshield was established to predict
the damage initiation and propagation of the windshield after bird impact via the nonlinear
finite element method, combined with the user-defined materials subroutine (VUMAT) of
the ABAQUS/Explicit software. In the model, an elastic-plastic and a nonlinear
viscoelasticity constitutive model were adopted to define the material constitutive response of
bird and windshield, respectively. The shear failure criteria and the tensile failure were
selected to identify the damage of bird and windshield, respectively. The corresponding
elements will be removed when the materials meet the above failure criteria. The supporting
structure of the windshield glass was modeled with skins and rubber gaskets herein instead
of modeled with the boundary condition directly. The analysis results include the
instantaneous deformation of bird and windshield, the damage modes of the windshield,
displacement curves and strain curves of the measured points on the windshield, which
agree well with the experimental results.
I. Introduction
T HE bird impact against aircraft structures can cause catastrophic damages. The statistical data shows that the
probability of the windshield and cockpit impacted by birds is about 21.4%, which is the biggest probability
comparing with the other parts of the aircraft. The records also present that the impacted windshield and cockpit are
much more dangerous than the other parts.
It is unpractical to avoid the bird-strike accident, but important to take into account the windshields capability
against bird-strike. It is necessary to carry out the full-scale bird-strike experiments in order to determine the degree
of damage after bird-strike, to evaluate the dynamic failure position for the windshield and to obtain the critical
speed of the bird for the structure configuration, support boundary and material properties of the windshield in a
structural design. The bird-strike experiment costs a lot of money and human resources, and usually, is not directly
instructive to the design of the new windshield. The reason is that most of the bird impact tests only record the data
measured from some specific surface points on the windshield specimens rather than the total deformation response,
especially, the instantaneous failure characteristics of the structure during the impact process. With the rapid
development of computer and finite element method, the numerical analysis has been increasingly adopted to
analyze bird impacts at locations and in conditions without considered in the experimental tests, as well as to
evaluate the effectiveness of design modifications to improve the structural response and even for simulations on
design hypotheses, before carrying out any preliminary test.
In the paper, both experiment and numerical simulation of bird impact on aircraft windshield are presented. The
numerical simulation is carried out based on ABAQUS/Explicit, a nonlinear finite element program. In the
simulation, the bird adopts an elastic-plastic model with shear failure, verified in this paper with an instance in the
other literature. The windshield is modeled in a nonlinear viscoelasticity constitutive material, which is implemented
by the user-defined subroutine VUMAT within ABAQUS/Explicit. A comparison between the simulation results
and the experiment data shows a good agreement.
1
PhD Candidate, Aerospace Engineering College, MB 301, 29 Yudao Street.
2
Professor, Aerospace Engineering College, MB 301, 29 Yudao Street.
3
PhD Candidate, Aerospace Engineering College, MB 301, 29 Yudao Street.
1
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
Copyright 2009 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved.
II. Experiment
2
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
condition of the current impact point (C2).
In the test, the process of bird-strike on the windshield is photographed with the high-speed cameras, of which
the exposure speed is 3000 pictures per second. It can be seen that the windshield has large deformation and is
accompanied with strong shocks. The failure of the windshield does not occur at the initial period of bird-strike, but
after some time due to the bending deformation.
Table 1. Experimental results of the bird impact on windshields tests
Windshield No. Impact No. Velocity / km/h Damage status
1# 1 345 No failure
1# 2 380 Fragmented
2# 1 365 Fragmented
3# 1 340 No failure
3# 2 360 Fragmented
A. FE Model of Bird
1) Bird Geometric Model
The mass of bird is 1.8kg (4 lb) in order to keep
consistent with the real bird in the test. The bird is
modeled within a Lagrangian approach as a cylinder
with hemispherical ends 2, of which the size is shown in
Fig. 4. The model consists of 5916 solid elements (C3D4)
with an average element length 12~13 mm.
2) Bird Material Constitutive Equation
The characterization of the bird material response is
a major issue and difficulty in bird impact analysis3,4.
The real bird has bones, blood and flesh. It is very Figure 4. Bird geometric model.
difficult to define the bird material constitutive response.
The bird model has been regarded as elastic material,
elastic plastic material, or a jet of fluid by some authors.
For example, Johnson4, Hanssen5 and Brockman6,7 used
a polynomial equation of state to represent the bird
material constitutive response. Bai8, Wan Xiaopeng9 and
Airoldi10 used the elastic-plastic material to represent the
impacting bird.
The paper adopts the elastic-plastic model with
failure criteria. The shear failure criteria are used in the
present model. The shear failure model is based on the
value of the equivalent plastic strain at element
integration points. The failure is assumed to occur when
the damage parameter exceeds one11. The damage
parameter, , is defined as Bird
= ( 0 + ) f
pl pl pl
Figure 6. Displacement-time curve of the center of Figure 7. Displacement along the width of the plate
the plate. at 1.24ms after the beginning of the impact.
B. FE Model of Windshield
1) Windshield Modeling
In the Fig.1, it shows the supporting structure of the windshield glass. The FE model of the windshield only
takes into account the glass in usual to simplify the modeling process. The supporting structures are simplified by a
corresponding boundary condition of the glass.
In order to take into account the impact of the skin, frame and rubber gaskets on the dynamic response of
windshield glass, the complete windshield with glass and the surrounding structures are modeled herein (Fig. 8). All
the elements are eight nodes solid elements (C3D8R) in ABAQUS/Explicit. The boundary of the surrounding
structure is simplified as a fixed support.
2) Constitutive Equation of Windshield
4
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
The material of the windshield studied in this model is YB-3 PMMA material, of which the dynamic mechanical
behavior from the quasi-static low strain ratio ( = 10 s ) to the impacting high strain ratio ( = 10 s ) is 4 1 5 1
investigated by Wang12. It is shown in Ref. 12 that YB-3 PMMA is a viscoelastic material which is sensitive to
strain ratio. For the problem of large deformation under impact load, a linear viscoelastic model is not suitable in the
analysis. The material can be well described with the following non-linear viscoelastic constitutive equation, named
Zhu-Wang-Tang (ZWT) constitutive equation as Eq. (1). The ZWT model is composed of a nonlinear spring and
two Maxwell elements as shown in Fig. 9.
t t
= E0 + + + E1 exp( exp(
t t
2 3
) d + E 2 ) d (1)
0
1 0
2
The first three terms in Eq. (1) describe the nonlinear elastic equilibrium response, in which E0, , are the
nonlinear elastic parameters. The first integration term in Eq. (1) describes the viscoelastic response for low strain
rates, in which E1, 1 are the elastic modulus and relaxation time of the corresponding Maxwell element I
respectively. The second integration term describes the viseoelastic response for high strain rates, in which E2, 2 are
the elastic constant and relaxation time of the corresponding Maxwell element II respectively.
As the windshield is modeled in a three dimensional elements, Eq. (1) is to be modified into a three-dimensional
form13, 14 as shown in Eq. (2).
t t
Ekl
Ekl
t t
S ij = E0 [ A] Ekl + Eij + Eij + E1
2 3
[ A] e
1
d + E 2 [ A] e
2
d (2)
0
0
In Eq. (2), Sij and Eij are the second Poila-Kirchhoff stress tensor and Green strain tensor respectively. [A] is
three-dimensional isotropic elasticity matrix, defined as Eq. (3), in which is the Poisson ratio.
1 0 0 0
1 0 0 0
1 1 0 0 0
[ A] = (3)
(1 + )(1 2 ) 0 0 0 (1 2 ) 2 0 0
0
0 0 0 (1 2 ) 2 0
0 0 0 0 0 (1 2 ) 2
In Eq. (2), the viscoelastic stress tensor of low strain rate at the time t is defined as Eq. (4). Then, the stress
tensor at t+t can be written in Eq. (5). Equation 6 can be considered 13, 15, 16 when t is small enough. So the
Equation (5) becomes Eq. (7). The stress tensor increment can be written as Eq. (8).
t
Ekl
[ A]
t
Qij = E1
1t
e
1
d (4)
0
t + t t t
E
t + t
E
t + t
1 t + t 1 1 1
(5)
t + t t + t
= E d = e d
kl kl
Qij 1
[ A] e E 1
[ A] e
0 0
t + t t t
E kl E kl E kl
= = (6)
t
t t t t t t
E kl Ekl
t t
E kl
[ A]
1 t +t 1 t
1 t + t
1 1 1 1
Qij =e E( e d + [ A] e d ) = e Qij + E [ A] (1 e ) (7)
t
1 1 1
t
0 t
t t t
E kl
1 t + t 1t 1 1 1
Q = Qij
1
Qij = E [ A] 1 1
(1 e ) (1 e )Qij (8)
t
In the same way, the viscoelastic stress tensor for high strain rate and its increment can be written as Eq. (9) and
Eq. (10) respectively.
t
E kl
2
(9)
t
2t
Qij = E 2
[ A] e d
0
t t
Ekl
t
2
Q = E2 2 [ A]
2
(1 e
2
) (1 e
2
)Qij (10)
t
5
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
Based on the above discussion, the increment of the second Poila-Kirchhoff stress tensor, Sij, in time t is defined
as Eq. (11). The recursive equation of the stress tensor is written as Eq. (12).
t t t t
Ekl Ekl
t t
6
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
a) Time=0 ms b) Time=1ms c) Times=2 ms d) Time=3 ms
Figure 10. Comparison of bird and windshield deformation between simulation and experiment .
V. Conclusion
Both experiment and numerical simulation of aircraft
windshield subjected to bird impact are studied. The
experiment shows that for the windshield and its support
structure the critical failure velocity of the bird is between
345 km/h and 365 km/h in the condition of the above
mentioned impact point. The comparison between the
simulation results and the experiment data for
instantaneous deformation of bird and windshield, damage
modes of the windshield, displacement curves and strain
curves of the measured points on the windshield show that
the numerical simulation has high accuracy. The bird
material model and the windshield material model built in Figure 14. Comparison of sensor B1 strain.
the paper can be applied in the dynamic response
simulation of windshield against bird-strike. A modified failure criterion of the windshield needs to be considered in
the future.
References
1
Yang, J. L., Cai, X. J., Wu, C. H., Experiment And FEM Study of Windshield Subjected to High Speed Bird Impact,
ACTA Mechanica Sinica, Vol.19, No.6, 2003, pp. 543-550.
2
Zhu, S. H., Tong, M. B., Study on Bird Shape Sensitivity to Dynamic Response of Bird Strike on Aircraft Windshield,
Journal of Nanjing University of Aeronautics & Astronautics, Vol. 40, No. 4, 2008, pp. 551-555. [in Chinese]
3
Airoldi, A., Cacchione, B., Modelling of Impact Forces and Pressures in Lagrangian Bird Strike Analyses, International
Journal of Impact Engineering, Vol.32, No.10, 2006, pp.1651-1677.
4
Johnson, A. F., Holzapfel, M., Modelling Soft Body Impact on Composite Structures, Composite Structures, Vol. 61, No.1,
2003, pp.103-113.
5
Hanssen, A. G., Girard, Y., Olovsson, L., Berstad, T., L angseth, M., A Numerical Model for Bird Strike of Aluminum
Foam-Based Sandwich Panels, International Journal of Impact Engineering, Vol.32, No.7, 2006, pp.1127-1144.
6
Brockman, R. A., Held, T. W. ,Explicit Finite Element Method for Transparency Impact Analysis, University of Dayton
Research Institute, Rept. WL-TR-91-3006, Dayton, Ohio, 1991.
7
Stoll, F., Brockman, R. A. ,Finite Element Simulation of High-Speed Soft-Body Impacts, AIAA-97-1093, 1997, pp.334-
344.
8
Bai, J. Z., Inverse Issue Study of Bird-Impact to Aircraft Windshield Based on Neural Network Method, PhD thesis,
Northwestern Polytechnical University, 2003. [in Chinese]
9
Wan, X. P., Gong, L., Zhao, M. Y., Hou, C., A Method for Calculating Anti-Bird Impact Capability of an Aircraft Wing
Using ANSYS/LS-DYNA Software, Journal of North western Polytechnical University, Vol.25, No.2, 2007, pp.285-288. [in
Chinese]
8
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
10
Airoldi, A., Tagliapietra, D., Bird Impact Simulation Against a Hybrid Composite and Metallic Vertical Stabilizer,
Proceedings of the 42nd AIAA/ASME/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics, and Materials Conference, Seattle, WA,
USA, April 2001, A2001-1390.
11
Hibbit Karlsson Sorenson, Inc., ABAQUS User's Manual, version 6.7, 2007.
12
Wang, L. L., Zhu, X. X., Shi, S. Q., Gan, S., and Bao, H. S., An Impact Dynamics Investigation on Some Problems in Bird
Strike on Windshields of High Speed Aircrafts, Acta Aeronautica et Astronautica Sinica, Vol.12, No.2, 1991, pp.B27-B33. [in
Chinese]
13
Xie, L. S., Sun, L. X., Fan, X. J., Dynamic Response Analysis for Nonlinear Viscoelastic Structure to the Birdstrike,
Journal of Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Vol.27, No.6, 1995, pp.738-743. [in Chinese]
14
Swanson, S. R., Christensen, L. W., A Constitutive Formulation for High-Elongation Propellants, Journal of Spacecraft
and Rockets, Vol.20, No.6, 1983, pp. 559-566.
15
Feng, Z. Z., Wang, X. J., Wang, F. S., Gao, X. S., Yue, Z. F., Implementation and its Application in Finite Element
Analysis of Constitutive Model for ZWT Nonlinear Viscoelastic Material, Journal of Materials Science & Engineering, Vol.25,
No.2, 2007, pp.269-272. [in Chinese]
16
Wang, X. J., Feng, Z. Z., Wang, F. S., Yue, Z. F., Dynamic Response Analysis of Bird Strike on Aircraft Windshield
Based on Damage-modified Nonlinear Viscoelastic Constitutive Relation, Chinese Journal of Aeronautics, Vol.20, No. 6, 2007,
pp. 511-517.
9
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics