Multi-scale Finite Element Based Durability and Reliability Analysis of

Fibre reinforced polymer composite structures are expected to experience a range of hygro-thermal environmental conditions during their service life. Since the presence of moisture and temperate can cause plasticization of the polymer matrix, alter the stress state, and degrade the fibre/matrix interface, an understanding of moisture diffusion and heat transfer is essential for predicting structural performance. In this paper, the durability of fibre reinforced polymer composite plate is investigated using reliability analysis. A multi-scale finite element based reliability method is adopted to consider both micro-scale and macro-scale random variables. To investigate the degradation in material properties induced by temperature and moisture, and simulate the structure serving in hot/wet environment, computational homogenization is used to solve the coupled heat conduction and moisture transport problem in heterogeneous materials. A numerical study is carried out to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed method, and the evolution in time of the probability of failure is computed.