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Both plywood and medium density fiberboard (MDF) are often intended to be applied in conditions with fungal decay risk, which can lead to a decrease in physical and mechanical properties. It is thus essential to understand the detailed performance of the panels under fungal decay over time. In the presented research, the specimens were exposed to wet vermiculite inoculated with Pleurotus ostreatus for 14 weeks. A non-destructive flexural vibration method (resonalyser) was used to measure the Young's modulus (MOE) of the specimens, whereas the internal structure and mass loss distribution were monitored with X-ray CT scanning. The significant MOE decrease of MDF for interior use is a result of internal cracking. MDF produced with acetylated fibers showed only 1.5% mass loss and 10% MOE decrease. Plywood specimens exhibit a MOE decrease of approximately 12% at incipient fungal decay partially resulting from water dynamics and structural changes. There is a linear relationship between MOE decrease and mass loss, yet different for different types of plywood. Most mass loss occurs in the surface layers causing significant MOE decrease of entire plywood specimens, whereas the mass loss of the inner layers is influenced by structural properties of the veneers such as grain direction.

Laminated composites materials are mostly used in dynamically loaded structures. The design of these structures with finite element packages is focused on vibrations, elastic deformations and failure control. Damping is often neglected because of its assumed secondary importance and also because of dearth of information on relevant material properties. This trend is prone to change as it is now realised that damping plays an increasingly important role in vibration comfort, noise radiation and crash simulations. This paper shows in a first step how to identify the orthotropic elastic and damping properties of single layer fibre-reinforced composite material sheets using a new extended version of the Resonalyser procedure. The procedure is based on the elastic-viscoelastic correspondence principle and uses a mixed numerical experimental method. In a subsequent step, the complex laminate stiffness values are computed using the identified single layer material properties. To validate this approach, the modal damping ratios of arbitrary laminated plates of different materials at several resonance frequencies are predicted and experimentally verified.

A novel method is introduced for the measurement of a 3D strain field by exploiting the interaction between ultrasound waves and geometrical characteristics of the insonified specimen. First, the response of obliquely incident harmonic waves to a deterministic surface roughness is utilized. Analysis of backscattered amplitudes in Bragg diffraction geometry then yields a measure for the in-plane strain field by mapping any shift in angular dependency. Secondly, the analysis of the reflection characteristics of normal incident pulsed waves in frequency domain provides a measure of the out-of-plane normal strain field component, simply by tracking any change in the stimulation condition for a thickness resonance. As such, the developed ultrasonic strain gauge yields an absolute, contactless and single-sided mapping of a local 3D strain field, in which both sample preparation and alignment procedure are needless. Results are presented for cold-rolled DC06 steel samples onto which skin passing of the work rolls is applied. The samples have been mechanically loaded, introducing plastic strain levels ranging from 2 % up to 35 %. The ultrasonically measured strains have been validated with various other strain measurement techniques, including manual micrometer, longitudinal and transverse mechanical extensometer and optical mono- and stereovision digital image correlation. Good agreement has been obtained between the ultrasonically determined strain values and the results of the conventional methods. As the ultrasonic strain gauge provides all three normal strain field components, it has been employed for the extraction of Lankford ratios at different applied longitudinal plastic strain levels, revealing a strain dependent plastic anisotropy of the investigated DC06 steel sheet.

Already in the early 1980's, it has been conjectured that the pulsed ultrasonic polar scan (P-UPS) provides a unique fingerprint of the underlying mechanical elasticity tensor at the insonified material spot. Until now, that premise has not been thoroughly investigated, nor validated, despite the opportunities this would create for NDT and materials science in general. In this paper, we report on the first-ever implementation of an inverse modeling technique on the basis of a genetic optimization scheme in order to extract quantita- tive information from a P-UPS. We validate the optimization approach for synthetic data, and apply it to experimentally obtained polar scans for annealed aluminum, cold rolled DC-06 steel as well as for carbon fiber reinforced plastics. The investigated samples are plate-like and do not require specific preparation. The inverted material characteristics show good agreement with literature, micro-mechanical models as well as with results obtained through conventional testing procedures.

Purpose Finite element analysis has been used extensively in the study of biomechanical modeling of the breast. However, issues regarding the complexity of material models and the influences of geometric boundary conditions on the accuracy of a breast Finite Element (FE) model are still under debate. This work demonstrates the importance of material modeling in FE models of the breast. Methods A simple hemispherical geometry is used to model the shape of a human breast. Different material models are being investigated to accurately model changes in terms of displacement, stress, and reaction forces distribution. Results The results obtained using nonlinear material models are compared with those obtained employing their linear approximation. Results have shown that differences, in terms of displacement, ranging between 20% and more than 80%, may occur and that large differences are present in terms of maximum principal stresses when the displacement is correctly approximated. Conclusions This study clearly shows that, in a FE model, simulating large deformations material modeling strongly influences the accuracy of the solution.

This article describes an inverse method for the identification of the plastic behavior of aluminum plates subjected to sudden blast loads. The method uses full-field optical measurements taken during the first milliseconds of a free air explosion and the finite element method for the numerical prediction of the blast response. The identification is based on a damped least-squares solution according to the Levenberg–Marquardt formulation. Three different rate-dependent plasticity models are examined. First, a combined model based on linear strain hardening and the strain rate term of the Cowper–Symonds model, secondly, the Johnson–Cook model and finally, a combined model based on a bi-exponential relation for the strain hardening term and the strain rate term of the Cowper–Symonds model. A validation of the method and its sensitivity to measurement uncertainties is first provided according to virtual measurements generated with the finite element method. Next, the plastic behavior of aluminum is identified using measurements from real free air explosions obtained from a controlled detonation of C4. The results show that inverse methods can be successfully applied for the identification of the plastic behavior of metals subjected to blast waves. In addition, the material parameters identified with inverse methods enable the numerical prediction of the material’s response with increased accuracy.

Local stiffness of Euler–Bernoulli beams can be identified by dividing the bending moment of a deformed beam by the local curvature. Curvature and moment distributions can be derived from the modal shape of a beam vibrating at resonance. In this article, the modal shape of test beams is measured by both scanning laser vibrometry (SLV) and shearography. Shearography is an interferometric optical method that produces full-field displacement gradients of the inspected surface. Curvature can be obtained by two steps of derivation of the modal amplitude (in the case of SLV) or one step of derivation of the modal shape slope (in the case of shearography). Three specially prepared aluminium beams with a known stiffness distribution are used for the validation of both techniques. The uncertainty of the identified stiffness distributions with both techniques is compared and related to their signal-to-noise ratios. A strength and weakness overview at the end of the article reveals that the shearography is the technique that shows the most advantages.

Conventionally, the mechanical strength of clinched connections is determined by a single shear lap test and/or a pull-out test. However, in most practical applications a combination of shear and pull-out is exerted on the clinched joint. This paper deals with the development of an Arcan-like device which enables to introduce various shear/tensile ratios in a clinched assembly. An experimental survey of the multi-axial behaviour of a non-cutting single-stroke round clinched connection of two DC05 sheets, which is mild deep drawing steel, is conducted with this modified Arcan setup. These experimental results are used to check the validity of numerical models that predict the strength under multi-axial loading. Since the forming of a clinch is a fairly complex sheet metal operation, a good knowledge of the plastic material properties and the frictional behaviour is of the utmost importance to perform a sufficiently accurate FEA simulation. The impact of these factors on the multi-axial loading behaviour of the DC05–DC05 connection is investigated. ispartof: International Journal of Material Forming vol:6 issue:4 pages:437-451 status: published

In this international permeability benchmark exercise, in-plane permeability data for two reinforcement fabrics, obtained using a total of 16 different experimental procedures, were compared. Although, for each procedure, the results appear consistent, different procedures result in a scatter of up to one order of magnitude in principal permeability values for each fabric at any given fibre volume fraction. The ratio of the principal permeability values varies by factors of up to 2. While experimental uncertainties and variability of the specimens affect the scatter in results for any single series of experiments, it is suspected that the main source of scatter in results from different procedures is related to human factors. Aiming at standardisation of measurement methods and interchangeability of results, "good practice" guidelines will be formulated in order to eliminate sources of scatter. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The most common way to evaluate the stress–strain relation of sheet metal is by performing standard tensile tests. However, those tests only allow the identification of the hardening behaviour up to the point of maximum uniform elongation, at least when using standard measuring equipment and simple analytical formulas to derive the relation between force and stress, and, elongation and strain. Usually the hardening behaviour beyond this point is estimated by extrapolation of the hardening behaviour before the point of maximum uniform elongation. Such procedure may yield very different results, depending on the hardening law which is fitted to the available experimental data. Other methods which deal with the problem of extended yield curve identification have been proposed and the most applied among them are finite-element based inverse approaches. This paper presents an alternative method to identify the post-necking hardening behaviour of sheet metal without using a finite element model. The key point in the presented method is the minimization of the discrepancy between the internal and external work in the necking zone during a tensile test. The main focus of this paper is on the presentation of the method, the underlying assumptions and the experimental validation. In addition, the method was applied to identify two common hardening laws for DC05, which is a mild deep drawing steel, using experimental data from the pre- and post-necking region.

The aim of this article is to study the accuracy of finite element simulations in predicting the tool force occurring during the single point incremental forming (SPIF) process. The forming of two cones in soft aluminum was studied with two finite element (FE) codes and several constitutive laws (an elastic---plastic law coupled with various hardening models). The parameters of these laws were identified using several combinations of a tensile test, shear tests, and an inverse modeling approach taking into account a test similar to the incremental forming process. Comparisons between measured and predicted force values are performed. This article shows that three factors have an influence on force prediction: the type of finite element, the constitutive law and the identification procedure for the material parameters. In addition, it confirms that a detailed description of the behavior occurring across the thickness of the metal sheet is crucial for an accurate force prediction by FE simulations, even though a simple analytical formula could provide an otherwise acceptable answer.

This paper describes the identification of hardening parameters of DC05 sheet metal and contact friction coefficients using a multi-layered upsetting test (MLUT), the modified two specimen method (MTSM) and a finite element based inverse method. The MTSM is adopted in order to identify the friction coefficient between the tools and the stacked circular specimens which are cut from the base material by spark erosion. Next, the hardening behaviour is identified inversely by combining the results of a MLUT and finite element simulations of the test setup. Finally, the results are compared with standard tensile tests and it is shown that the MLUT is a viable alternative for the identification of the local hardening behaviour of sheet metal where standard test specimens cannot be prepared due to size limitations of the specimen.

The resonant-based identification of the in-plane elastic properties of orthotropic materials implies the estimation of four principal elastic parameters: E 1 , E 2 , G 12 , and ν 12 . The two elastic moduli and the shear modulus can easily be derived from the resonant frequencies of the flexural and torsional vibration modes, respectively. The identification of the Poisson’s ratio, however, is much more challenging, since most frequencies are not sufficiently sensitive to it. The present work addresses this problem by determining the test specimen specifications that create the optimal conditions for the identification of the Poisson’s ratio. Two methods are suggested for the determination of the Poisson’s ratio of orthotropic materials: the first employs the resonant frequencies of a plate-shaped specimen, while the second uses the resonant frequencies of a set of beam-shaped specimens. Both methods are experimentally validated using a stainless steel sheet.

The capability to simulate the flow of resin through a porous reinforcement by FE modelling has become very important for designing RTM production processes for high-performance composite parts. The key parameter in RTM flow simulations is the fibre reinforcement permeability. The measurement of this material parameter is still not standardized and many different set-ups have been proposed. Recently, a stereolithography technique was used to produce a textile-like solid specimen with anisotropic permeability, designed as a reference for calibration and comparison of permeability measurement set-ups and for validation of numerical permeability computation software. Unlike real textiles, the permeability properties of such reference specimens do not vary from test to test. Excellent repeatability of the experiments is achieved. When used for benchmarking, any discrepancy between different measurements on this specimen must be attributed to the set-up and data processing. This paper presents the first experimental measurements of the permeability of such reference specimens, obtained with a 2D central injection rig. The measured values, with principal components of the 2D permeability tensor of 2.47 ± 0.09 × 10−9 m2 and 5.44 ± 0.22 × 10−9 m2, are in good agreement with the values predicted using numerical permeability computation software. Statistics from a series of measurements using the same set-up show that the precision of the permeability identification depends on the data processing procedure. An approach which incorporates a numerical model that is also valid after the fluid reached an edge of the reinforcement performs significantly better than the approach, based on an analytical approximation, which was used before.

The permeability of textile reinforcements is a crucial input for the simulation of the impregnation stage of a composite material fabrication process. In this paper, we present a fast and accurate simulation method for the permeability of a textile reinforcement, based on a finite difference discretisation of the Stokes equations. Results for single layer, multi-layer and sheared models are discussed. The influence of intra-yarn flow and periodic or wall boundary conditions are considered. We compare the numerically computed permeability values with experimental data.

The purpose of this article is to develop an inverse method for adjusting the material parameters for single point incremental forming (SPIF). The main idea consists in FEM simulations of simple tests involving the SPIF specificities (the “line test”) performed on the machine used for the process itself. This approach decreases the equipment cost. It has the advantage that the material parameters are fitted for heterogeneous stress and strain fields close to the ones occurring during the actual process. A first set of material parameters, adjusted for the aluminum alloy AA3103 with classical tests (tensile and cyclic shear tests), is compared with parameters adjusted by the line test. It is shown that the chosen tests and the strain state level have an important impact on the adjusted material data and on the accuracy of the tool force prediction reached during the SPIF process.

In the early 1980’s, the ultrasonic polar scan (UPS) technique was developed to assess the fiber direction of composites in a nondestructive way. In spite of the recognition by several researchers as being a sophisticated and promising methodology for nondestructive testing and materials science, little advance was made during the following 30 years. Recently however, the UPS technique experienced a strong revival and various modifications to the original UPS setup have been successfully implemented. This revival has exposed several powerful capabilities and interesting applications of the UPS technique for material characterization and damage assessment. This paper gives a short historical overview of the UPS technique for characterizing and inspecting (damaged) fiber reinforced plastics. In addition, a few future research lines are given which will further expand the applicability and potential of the UPS method to a broader range of (damaged) materials, bringing the UPS technique to the next level of maturity. ispartof: Applied Sciences vol:6 issue:2 status: published

Inverse methods offer a powerful tool for the identification of elasto-plastic material properties of metals. The basic principle of the inverse method we are studying, is to compare an experimentally measured strain field with a strain field computed by a finite element (FE) model. The material parameters in the FE model are iteratively tuned in such a way that the numerically computed strain field matches the experimentally measured field as closely as possible. One of the building blocks in this identification procedure is the optimization algorithm for the material parameters in the numerical model. The key problem of this optimization algorithm is the determination of a sensitivity matrix, which expresses the sensitivities of the strains with respect to the material parameters. This paper presents an analytical method for the calculation of this sensitivity matrix in the case of a tensile test with non-rotating principal axes of strain.

This paper presents a mixed numerical–experimental method for the identification of the four in-plane orthotropic engineering constants of composite plate materials. A biaxial tensile test is performed on a cruciform test specimen. The heterogeneous displacement field is observed by a CCD camera and measured by a digital image correlation (DIC) technique. The measured displacement field and the subsequently computed strain field are compared with a finite element simulation of the same experiment. The four independent engineering constants are unknown parameters in the finite element model. Starting from an initial value, these parameters are updated till the computed strain field matches the experimental strain field. Two specimen geometries are used: one with a centered hole to increase the strain heterogeneity and one without a hole. It is found that the non-perforated specimen yields the most accurate results.

Conventionally, the ultrasonic polar scan (UPS) records the amplitude or time of flight in reflection or transmission using short ultrasonic pulses for a wide range of incidence angles, resulting in a unique fingerprint of the critical bulk wave angles of the material at the insonified spot. Here, we investigate the use of quasi-harmonic ultrasound (bursts) in a polar scan experiment, experimentally as well as numerically. It is shown that the nature of the fingerprint drastically changes, and reveals the positions of the leaky Lamb angles. To compare with experiments, both plane wave and bounded beam simulations have been performed based on the recursive stiffness matrix method. Whereas the plane wave computations yield a pure Lamb wave angle fingerprint, this is no longer valid for the more realistic case of a bounded beam. The experimental recordings are fully supported by the bounded beam simulations. To complement the traditional amplitude measurement, experimental and numerical investigations have been performed to record, predict and analyze the phase of the transmitted ultrasonic beam. This results in the conceptual introduction of the 'phase polar scan', exposing even more intriguing and detailed patterns. In fact, the combination of the amplitude and the phase polar scan provides the complete knowledge about the complex transmission coefficient for every possible angle of incidence. This comprehensive information will be very valuable for inverse modeling of the local elasticity tensor based on a single polar scan experiment. Finally, the polar scan method has been applied for the detection of an artificial delamination. Contrary to the pulsed UPS, the quasi-harmonic UPS (both the amplitude and phase recording) shows a superior sensitivity to the presence of the delamination.

Time consumption is the major drawback of many existing set-ups for permeability measurement. This drawback has prevented many researchers from studying the statistical distribution of experimentally obtained permeability values. To overcome this problem—while maintaining the necessary accuracy—an automated central injection rig for permeability identification called ‘PIERS set-up’ (permeability identification using electrical resistance sensors) was developed. The PIERS set-up was used to characterize two typical glass fiber reinforcements. The test results demonstrated the presence of large scatter in the identified permeability values and hence the necessity to consider a statistical distribution of permeability values. The existence of a permeability distribution implies that a small number of measurements will not be sufficient to fully characterize the material. This paper discusses the necessary number of measurements to adequately characterize the statistical distribution and investigates the origins of the observed scatter. The paper also shows that the nesting of layers during stacking and mold closing is a major source of the observed variations in permeability values.

Quantitative shearography applications continue to gain practical importance. However, a study of the errors inherent in shearography measurements, related to calibration of the instrument and correction of the results, is most often lacking. This paper proposes a calibration and correction procedure for the out-of-plane shearography with a Michelson interferometer. The calibration is based on the shearography measurement of known rigid-body rotations of a flat plate and accounts for the local variability of the shearing distance. The correction procedure further compensates for the variability of the sensitivity vector and separates the two out-of-plane deformation gradients when they are coupled in the measurement. The correction procedure utilizes two shearography measurements of the same experiment with distinct shearing distances. The effectiveness of the proposed calibration procedure is demonstrated in the case of a static deformation of a centrally loaded plate, where the discrepancy between experimental and finite element analysis results is minimized.

Resin transfer molding (RTM) is becoming increasingly important as a production technique for FRPs. However, the design of molds that assures the production of parts with acceptable quality remains a difficult task. Simulation codes developed for design need reliable input data such as reinforcement permeability. The measurement of this material parameter is still not standardized and thus many different set-ups have been proposed. In this paper a new method will be presented that is much faster and much less operator-dependant than other set-ups. It is a 2D central injection set-up, based on the automatic detection of the flow front position as a function of time. For this purpose, simple electrical sensors were designed and an automated calculation procedure was programmed on a PC-based system. As will be shown, the elements of the permeability tensor are not single valued at a particular fiber volume fraction. Rather, each element displays a broad distribution. More importantly, the variations in the principal permeability values are not correlated since their ratio, the anisotropy, also displays a broad distribution.

This study investigates the use of both the amplitude and time-of-flight based pulsed ultrasonic polar scan (P-UPS) for the nondestructive detection and evaluation of fatigue damage in fabric reinforced composites. Several thermoplastic carbon fabric reinforced PPS specimens (CETEX), loaded under various fatigue conditions, have been scanned at multiple material spots according to the P-UPS technique in order to extract material degradation in a quantitative way. The P-UPS results indicate that shear dominated fatigued carbon/PPS goes with a reduction of shear properties combined with large fiber distortions. The P-UPS results of the tension-tension fatigued carbon/PPS samples on the other hand reveal a directional degradation of the stiffness properties, reaching a maximum reduction of −12.8 % along the loading direction. The P-UPS extracted damage characteristics are fully supported by simulations, conventional destructive tests as well as visual inspection. The results demonstrate the excellent capability of the P-UPS method for nondestructively assessing and quantifying both shear-dominated and tension-tension fatigue damage in fabric reinforced plastics.

In liquid composite moulding (LCM) techniques, the liquid resin has to flow a long distance to impregnate the dry fibres. The measure for the resistance of the fibre preform to the resin flow is the permeability of the fibre preform. Because of the dual-scale porous structure of the textile preforms, test fluid can influence the unsaturated permeability values through the interaction of the fluid and fibres. In this study, the influence of test fluid on the permeability measurement of several types of textile reinforcements is investigated. First the contact angle of various fluids and fibres was measured. Then the permeability measurement of the textile reinforcements was carried out. The results showed that the influence of test fluid is small under the test conditions.

The ultrasonic backscattering technique is employed for the characterization of a 2D surface corrugation which is superposed on or hidden on the backside of a polycarbonate sample. In contrast to previous studies where the incident angle at well-defined and a-priori known symmetry orientations of the surface structure is varied in order to extract the characteristic periodicities, the backscatter polar scan method incorporates an additional variation of the orientation of the vertical insonification plane within the experimental measurement protocol. As such, the characteristic periodicities as well as the surface symmetries can be extracted without any prior knowledge of the surface structure. As a benefit compared to optical methods, we have also validated this extended methodology for the investigation of a 2D subsurface corrugation. Although the diffraction conditions do not change in comparison with a visible 2D surface corrugation, we remark that additional attention is required in the sense that the elastic properties of the substrate material put further restrictions to the range of applicable ultrasonic frequencies. The characterized periodicities and symmetries are in excellent agreement with the design parameters of the (hidden) 2D surface grating.

A mixed numerical experimental approach is the basis of a new method for the identification of the material damping properties of fibre reinforced polymers, which provides an answer to many problems encountered in experimental damping characterization. Experimental modal parameters, measured on a plate specimen, are compared with corresponding results from a numerical calculation, thus allowing to determine the stiffness and damping properties of the material. The relation between the modal parameters (structural parameters) and the material parameters, is obtained by using a numerical model of the specimen in combination with the modal strain energy method.

Although Incremental Forming offers distinct advantages over traditional forming processes, such as short lead times and low setup costs, the process still has some drawbacks. Besides the obtainable accuracy, one of the main challenges of the process are the process limits. Many workpiece geometries cannot be manufactured due to the fact that the maximum wall angle that can be formed is limited for a certain sheet material and thickness to a given angle. Different solutions to this approach have been proposed and this paper further investigates one of those solutions, the multi step approach for single point incremental forming. Experiments were performed and compared with simulations to better understand the phenomena underlying the improved process performance.

Single point incremental forming (SPIF) suffers from process window limitations which are strongly determined by the maximum achievable forming angle. Forming consecutive, intermediate shapes can contribute to a significantly enlarged process window by allowing steeper maximum wall angles for a range of part geometries. In this paper an experimentally explored multi-step toolpath strategy is reported and the resulting part geometries compared to simulation output. Sheet thicknesses and strains achieved with these multi-step toolpaths were verified and contribute to better understanding of the material relocation mechanism underlying the enlarged process window.

Digital image correlation (DIC) is an optical-numerical full-field displacement measuring technique, which is nowadays widely used in the domain of experimental mechanics. The technique is based on a comparison between pictures taken during loading of an object. For an optimal use of the method, the object of interest has to be covered with painted speckles. In the present paper, a comparison is made between three different speckle patterns originated by the same reference speckle pattern. A method is presented for the determination of the speckle size distribution of the speckle patterns, using image morphology. The images of the speckle patterns are numerically deformed based on a finite element simulation. Subsequently, the displacements are measured with DIC-software and compared to the imposed ones. It is shown that the size of the speckles combined with the size of the used pixel subset clearly influences the accuracy of the measured displacements.

In load carrying applications one is mainly interested in the stiffness properties of the structural component. Elastic and shear moduli supplemented with section properties render the stiffness properties of the component. Moduli of isotropic materials are well known and well documented. However, this is not the case for composite materials. The developed procedure belongs to the group of mixed numerical experimental methods. The method makes use of modal data to determine the effective orthotropic material properties of composite beams. Modal reference data is experimentally obtained from the beam at hand. The other modal data set is obtained from a finite element model of the same beam. The orthotropic material properties, also called parameters, in the finite element model are then modified in such a way that both sets of modal data match. If those two sets match, the virtual model has “in a global sense” the same mass and stiffness properties as the real model. A program written in FEMtools is applied to five test cases. Results are discussed.

Inverse methods are a modern alternative technique to traditional standard testing for the identification of material parameters. The material parameters in the numerical model are the unknown parameters which will be aimed to identify. In this paper an alternative iterative strategy for material identification is proposed. The concept of the proposed strategy is based on the material behavior under an applied load which is described by the stress-strain curve. The material parameters can be identified based on observation strain field and numerically stress field.

The simulation of a resin flow through a porous medium by FE-models has become a very important aspect for the design of a high-performance RTM produced composite part. The key parameter to perform RTM flow simulations is the fibre reinforcement permeability. Unfortunately, permeability measurements are not yet fully standardized and thus many different set-ups have been proposed. A major problem in comparing different set-ups has always been the fact that there exists no reliable reference material on which a comparative permeability measurement can be performed. This paper presents a solid test specimen, produced with a stereolithography technique, which can be used as a reference sample for calibration of test rigs and for comparison of results from different test rigs. Since the permeability properties of the specimen do not vary from test to test, an excellent repeatability of the experiments is obtained and any measured difference must be attributed to the set-up.