Determination of bending failure load of hat-type folded composite plate using finite element method

This paper analyzed the failure of the hat-type laminated composite plate under a bending load. Based on the Reissner-Mindlin plate theory and isoparametric rectangular plate elements with five degrees of freedom per node, an algorithm and Matlab code were established to compute the stresses and bending failure load of the folded composite plate according to Tsai-Wu and Maximum stresses criteria. The numerical results are reliable when compared with the published results in the literature for some specific cases.