Classification of solutions for guided waves in anisotropic composites with large numbers of layers

Guided waves are used for the non-destructive evaluation in automotive and aerospace industries. There is a trend leaning away from isotropic materials to the manufacturing based on composites. However, the elastic wave dynamics in such materials is considerably more complicated. Much effort has been committed to the calculation of guided waves' dispersion curves in composites. Lots of methods and tools are available, but it becomes difficult when there are more than one hundred layers. In this paper the calculation of dispersion diagrams and mode shapes using the stiffness matrix method is demonstrated. Boundary conditions are implemented into the stiffness matrix method that allow for the separate tracing of the various mode families. Shear horizontal modes are modeled with the transfer matrix method without facing any numerical instability. It is elucidated just how the occurrence of the mode families depends on the system's symmetry and wave propagation direction. As a result, the robustness and reliability of guided wave modeling by using the stiffness method is improved, and more information about the modes is yielded. This is demonstrated on exemplary layups of the fiber reinforced polymer T800/913, with up to 400 layers. Referencing is made against results from DISPERSE^® (Imperial College London, London, UK) for selected cases.