The effect of core height on energy absorbing capacity in aluminum corrugated sandwich panels

Abstract

In this study, energy absorbing capacity of brazed and polyurethane adhesively bonded corrugated aluminum sandwich panels were investigated. In sandwich panels, Al 1050 H14 trapezoidal zig-zag corrugated cores and face and interlayer sheets were used. Each sandwich panel has core orientation of 0 degrees/0 degrees or 0 degrees/90 degrees. The cores used in these panels were smaller, core height is about 3 mm, in contrast to conventional sandwich cores. Impact tests were conducted at 3 and 6 m/s with spherical projectors. Adhesively bonded sandwich panels were also tested at 6 m/s with flat and conical projectors. Numerical models were prepared in LSDYNA to investigated the deformation behavior of cores. Panels tested with flat and conical projectors experienced complete perforation and absorbed more energy at configuration of 0 degrees/0 degrees core orientation. However, panels tested with spherical projectors were not perforated and they absorbed more energy at configuration of 0 degrees/90 degrees core orientation. Energy absorbing capacity of the panels were also compared to the panels having 9 mm height corrugated cores. The results showed that effective collapsing length was seen to increase due to increase in core height and impact energy distributed the whole panel surface more homogenous manner.