The damage tolerance of sandwich panels with notches was investigated experimentally. Sandwich panels with notch lengths ranging between 10 inches and 0.5 inches, and notch depth of 0.25 inches, were subjected to in-plane tensile and compressive loads. Two different sandwich facesheet configurations, [(0F)_2/(45-F)_3/(0F)_2] and[0_F,/0_T/45-F,/0_T/45_F/0r_/0F], which have different proportions of 0°, 90° and 45° degree fibers were investigated. The behavior of thenotched panels under in-plane loading, their strengths and failure modes were observed and the results reported. The strength and failure modes were dependent on the facesheet configuration, notch length and loading type. The [(0_F)_2 /(45_F)_3 /(0_F)-2] facesheet panels exhibited net-section failures due to stress concentration under both tension and compression loading, for all notch lengths. The [0_F /0_T/45_F /0_T/45-F /0-T /0_F] facesheet panels exhibited longitudinal splitting failure modes under tensile loading, while a net section failure was observed under compression loads. The longitudinal splitting was the initiation mode for all notch lengths under tension, but the splitting propagated longitudinally, in the case of the 10 inch notch alone. For shorter notches, the splitting propagated along a tortuous path across the width resulting in net-section failure. The apparent strain concentration factors based on strain measurements adjacent to the notch boundary was observed to be higher for compression loading for both the sandwich configurations investigated.
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