This book provides an introduction to the micromechanics of fiber-reinforced laminae which
deals with the prediction of the macroscopic mechanical lamina properties based on the
mechanical properties of the constituents i.e. fibers and matrix. Composite materials
especially fiber-reinforced composites are gaining increasing importance since they can
overcome the limits of many structures based on classical metals. Particularly the combination
of a matrix with fibers provides far better properties than the components alone. Despite their
importance many engineering degree programs do not treat the mechanical behavior of this class
of advanced structured materials in detail at least on the Bachelor degree level. Thus some
engineers are not able to thoroughly apply and introduce these modern engineering materials in
their design process. The focus is on unidirectional lamina which can be described based on
orthotropic constitutive equations. Three classical approaches to predict the elastic
properties i.e. the mechanics of materials approach the elasticity solutions with contiguity
after Tsai and the Halpin-Tsai relationships are presented. The quality of each prediction is
benchmarked based on two different sets of experimental values. The book concludes with
optimized representations which were obtained based on the least square approach for the used
experimental data sets.
