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Lightweight multilayer composite structure for

hydrogen storage tank

Chaoming He*, Rong Yu, Haoran Sun, Zilong Chen

School of Mechanical Engineering, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu 610031, China

article info abstract

Article history: Composite pressure vessel has been applied by NASA for the first time. Safe low-cost efficient
Received 25 March 2016 composite hydrogen-storing device is a key technique affecting the generalization and
Accepted 27 April 2016 application of hydrogen energy. By combining the shear theory and based on the highly
Available online xxx heave-stable shear behavior shell structure lightweight design, this paper describes re-
searches on the lightweight design of pressure vessel lining and, on the basis of completing
Keywords: the numerical analysis of hydrogen storage tank, extracts its stress isogram, achieving the
Hydrogen storage conformity or tangency of fiber weaving type with stress load isoline and accomplishing
Composite lightweight design of the tank and reduced production cost. The method herein can be
Lightweight further generalized to the storage of hydrogen energy and pipe component design.
© 2016 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

emission performance. For the generalization of hydrogen

Introduction energy, therefore, there is an urge to study the lightweight
design of hydrogen storage devices and meet requirements on
A composite pressure vessel normally consists of composite their economy and safety [4e6].
reinforcing layer, lining layer and protective layer. Over the By combining the shear theory, this paper describes re-
latest years after application of composite pressure vessel by searches on the lightweight design of pressure vessel lining
NASA for the first time, its application fields have been and, on the basis of completing the numerical analysis of
constantly developed and extended [1e3]. hydrogen storage tank, extracts its stress isogram, achieving
Because of the constant differentiation of technologies, the the conformity or tangency of fiber weaving type with stress
role played by lightweight design and lightweight material is load isoline, attaining a digitalized 3D auto fiber placement
becoming more and more important in fields like aeronautics/ technique, and accomplishing the lightweight design of the
astronautics, automobile manufacturing and construction. hydrogen storage tank and reduced production cost.
The benefit is obvious: lightweight can save material on the
one hand and save energy in the power system of kinetic
structures on the other hand. For large-scale utilization of
Multilayer structure and carbon fiber cross-ply
hydrogen energy, people must address themselves to such key
lamination based hydrogen storage tank
techniques as the making, storage and transport of hydrogen
lightweight design
and hydrogen energy conversion. Transport of hydrogen
represents a very large part of the entire hydrogen energy
70Mpa high-pressure gas tanks are used on Toyota Mirai for
supply chain in respect of economy, energy consumption and
hydrogen storage. Toyota Mirai carries two hydrogen tanks

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: [email protected] (C. He).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.04.184
0360-3199/© 2016 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article in press as: He C, et al., Lightweight multilayer composite structure for hydrogen storage tank, International
Journal of Hydrogen Energy (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.04.184
2 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y x x x ( 2 0 1 6 ) 1 e5

Fig. 1 e Carbon fiber reinforced plastics for Toyota Mirais hydrogen storage tank.

with internal volume of 122.4 L (front 60 L and rear 62.4 L) and modulus in the vertical fiber direction is 8 GPa, shear
total storing capacity of 5 kg.So the weight of fuel is actually modulus is 5 GPa, Poissons ratio is 0.3, tensile strength is
not heavy and, on the contrary, the tanks are remarkably 2,400 MPa, compressive strength is 1,000 MPa, shear
cumbersome. With the help of carbon fiber reinforced plastics strength is 76 MPa, and density is 1,800 kg/m3;
(CFRP), Toyota Mirais vehicular hydrogen storage tanks attain (2) Metal lining material: E ¼ 210 GPa, Poissons ratio is 0.3,
shell lightweight. At the same time, the physical properties of density is 7800 kg/m3, yield strength is 800 MPa, and
various fibers can be brought into effective play through tensile strength is 1100 MPa.
combined application of multiple fibers and different fiber (3) Condition under pressure: the pressure vessels remain
weaving types to accommodate forces on different tank areas; under internal pressure of 35 MPa.
hence 40% reduction of fibers used, as shown in Fig. 1.
To ensure driving safety on the premise of withstanding
700 atm, the hydrogen tanks have been designed to have a
four-layer structure. The aluminum-alloy tank is lined inter- Achieving metal lining reinforcement with shear
nally with plastic lining and wrapped externally in a protec- field theory
tive layer of carbon fiber reinforced plastics, with one more
shock-absorbing protective layer of fiber glass material Mechanical properties of hydrogen storage tanks fiber
added outside that protective layer. Fiber grain on each of the composite have something to do with stress load direction
layers has been additionally optimized, depending on and fiber orientation
different positions where it is on the tank, so that the fibers
run along the direction of pressure distribution to enhance the Conventional containers are liable to heave for their shell
effect of the protective layers. structure style. To increase heave load and heave safety
This paper will analyze round-section hydrogen storage remarkably, braces or ribs can be used to diminish the main
tanks with finite element software ANSYS. Since the tanks heave field. For the nodal line on the heave outline, these
have a symmetrical structure, we just need a 1/4 model to save braces or ribs have sufficient stiffness. For shear load (as
our calculation cost, with a tangible unit used as lining and caused by the bending and twisting of lateral force), however,
shell unit as wound composite, as shown in Fig. 2. Data in the stiffness and strength of rib lattice structure are often not
Ref. [7] are used as tank parameters: great enough. To fill the gap, a layer of thin shell can be
introduced to sustain the main shear stress load.
(1) Wound carbon fiber resin system: its tensile modulus is When the heave safety of the thin shell is increased, note
135 GPa, compressive modulus is 108 GPa, tensile that, although the heave field can be kept at a very small
value by mounting braces, their bending stiffness and tor-
sion stiffness may be just great enough to induce the nodal
line on the heave outline. On the other hand, the lattice
shape of rod structure is fairly sensitive to shear stress load
and therefore addition of a layer of shell over the structure
is of great benefit as it can sustain shear force (as caused by
lateral force or torsion). Fig. 3 shows the effect of these two
kinds of reinforcement; d) into which a) shell and the brace
lattice comprised of b) longitudinal beams and c) ribs are
combined has a highly heave-stable shear behavior shell
structure [8].

Cylinder heave-proofing stability calculation and analysis

Cylinder stress can be solved by the section method, but not

all the problems can. Helical seal head is an example, where
Fig. 2 e 1/4 finite element model of composite pressure the radius of curvature differs from point to point and stress
vessel. inside the wall varies. Such problems can be solved only by

Please cite this article in press as: He C, et al., Lightweight multilayer composite structure for hydrogen storage tank, International
Journal of Hydrogen Energy (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.04.184
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y x x x ( 2 0 1 6 ) 1 e5 3

Fig. 3 e Highly heave-stable shear behavior shell structure lightweight design.

taking a representative elemental volume from the shell and case. The variation curves shown in Fig. 4 is a comparison
analyzing its deformation under pressure. between the mechanical characteristic values of carbon fiber
For the heave of a homogeneous linear-elastic thin-wall epoxy resin composites; they can explain the effect of applied
load-bearing cylindrical shell axially under pressure, its load direction and fiber distribution direction on tensile
theoretical classical heave stress can be solved through a dif- strength and elastic modulus on the laminated surface. Here,
ferential equation derived from the Donnel Equation [9]. the composites have a same number of layers while the
Thus in this paper, a shell structure and a highly heave- laminated constructions are unidirectional, orthogonal and
stable shear behavior shell structure with equal mass and a multidirectional respectively [8]. The laminated single layer
volume of 60 L are devised and given numerical simulation shown in Fig. 4 indicates the fiber direction of relevant varia-
analysis. It can be known from the result of finite element tion curve instead of the mode of laminated construction. The
analysis that the stress values of the two have a same order of tensile strength and elastic modulus of cross composite
magnitude, but the latter is less deformed and, under the ac- become largest when stress load direction conforms to fiber
tion of externally applied concentrated lateral load, has direction (0 and 90 ).
increased flexural stiffness and can bear a greater heave- This paper takes a lining externally wrapped with a layer of
proofing load. carbon fiber composite. Numerical analysis is intended to
obtain a load pressure distribution isogram for tank body po-
sition so that fibers run along the direction of pressure dis-
tribution and form cross composition to enhance the effect of
Stress load size and direction based multilayer the protective layers.
fiber path placement Hydrogen storage tanks are up against more complex cir-
cumstances, such as high temperature and high pressure.
Numerical analysis based round-section hydrogen storage This implies new requirements on pressure vessel design.
tank stress load size and direction calculations Conventional round pressure vessels can meet requirements
no longer and researches on non-round ones have started off
Based on the mode of construction of fiber composite and a lot widely.
of material parameters, relevant direction and position design The experimental stress method, analytical method and
is carried out according to the state of stress load for the numerical method are main methods currently for stress
material performance of a composite structure. The anisot- analysis. The numerical analysis method has been widely
ropy of the material characteristic values of composite single- applied to engineering. Han Min [10] used ANSYS finite
layer and laminated plates is of decisive significance in this

Fig. 4 e Comparison between laminated mechanical behavior values of carbon fiber epoxy resin composites.

Please cite this article in press as: He C, et al., Lightweight multilayer composite structure for hydrogen storage tank, International
Journal of Hydrogen Energy (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.04.184
4 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y x x x ( 2 0 1 6 ) 1 e5

element software to carry out stress analysis of pressure

vessel and got an analysis result that is basically consistent
with the true situation. Ma Ya-juan [11] used the finite
element method to carry out stress analysis of pressure vessel
seal head and the error between her numerical analysis and
test is 10% or so.
A stress cloud chart for linings outermost layer is then
extracted by ANSYS in accordance with the numerical anal-
ysis method stated in Refs. [10,11]. See Fig. 5.

Fiber path placement with consideration given to hydrogen

storage tank stress load and direction

The helical winding angle on the cylindrical section as taken

in Ref. [12] is determined by Equation (1):

d0
a ¼ arcsin (1) Fig. 6 e Hydrogen storage tank stress load isoline.
D0
where d0 is the diameter of the polar axis of the interlining and
D0 is that of the cylinder.
Helical winding is a geodesic path. Winding angle a de- negligible. Therefore orthogonal composition formed through
creases continuously from 90 at the polar axis to a0 on the hoop winding and radial winding is a guarantee of conformity
cylindrical section and is determined by Equation (2): of fiber winding direction with load direction. The isogram can
reflect areas with same stress rather than the relation be-
d0 tween stress variation and the curvature of the camber where
a ¼ arcsin (2)
D the point is located. The method proposed in this paper cor-
where D is the swing diameter. responds to the high-angle helical winding for fringe
In ANSYS, Utility Menu > PlotCtrls > Device Options is shown strengthening and low-angle helical winding for bottom
in the mode isoline. In the popped-up dialog box, the check strengthening as used for hydrogen storage tanks on Toyota
box behind Vector mode (wireframe) is chosen and made on. By Mirai.
clicking on OK, an isogram is generated, as shown in Fig. 6. It can be known from the stress isogram that low-angle
Stresses on the cylinder mainly include axial tensile stress helical winding is used at the bottom of the body due to con-
sm generated by the internal pressure that acts on the end cap, centration of stresses. Hoop fiber placement at the opening of
which is known as radial stress or axial stress, and a tensile some model of hydrogen storage tank is optimized. As shown
force known as belt stress or circumferential stress expressed in Fig. 7, the paths of the full lines are the fringe paths of tows
as sq which is generated in the tangential direction on the while those of the dash lines are tracks taken by the placing
circumference as a result of uniform outward swell of the robot in the case of full-fiber placement. Using the hoop
cylinder under the action of the internal pressure. Since a placement algorithm, tows meet the stress isoline run
cylinder is usually a thin-wall container, sm and sq can be requirement except for those placed along the hoop in the
viewed as uniformly distributed and radial stress sr is opening area which, however, play a certain role in remitting
stress concentration in that area.
Reinforcement is a must for an opening set up over a
composite structure. The opening will cause some fibers in the
composite placement layer to be cut off and a hole-side high-

Fig. 7 e Hoop placement optimization at hydrogen storage

Fig. 5 e Metal linings equivalent stress distribution chart. tank opening.

Please cite this article in press as: He C, et al., Lightweight multilayer composite structure for hydrogen storage tank, International
Journal of Hydrogen Energy (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.04.184
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y x x x ( 2 0 1 6 ) 1 e5 5

Acknowledgments

Funded by National Natural Science Foundation of Chi-

na(NO.51275431), Science and Technology Plan Projects in
Sichuan province, CHINA (NO.2014GZX0009), and China
Scholarship Council (No. 201407005085).

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Fig. 8 e Hydrogen storage tank opening reinforcement.

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Please cite this article in press as: He C, et al., Lightweight multilayer composite structure for hydrogen storage tank, International
Journal of Hydrogen Energy (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.04.184