Automated tape placement (ATP) is a process recently developed for the production of large parts (plates, shells) made of thermoplastic composites. In ATP a tape is placed on the previous ply and welded by a local heating and pressure to build up a laminated structure. The numerical modeling of such a process is a challenging issue since the thermal history of each ply is different, depending on its position within the structure. The evaluation of residual stresses is particularly important for determining the deformed shape of the piece at the end of the process. A numerical model based on the Proper Generalized Decomposition is proposed. The solution of the 3D thermal problem is performed first. Thermal contact resistances are in particular introduced in order to model the imperfect heat conduction at the interface of two neighboring plies. The computed temperature field is then introduced in the mechanical model considering a thermo-elastic behavior for the material. An incremental approach is therefore used on a control volume in order to compute the evolution of the stresses within the laminated structure during the process.

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