Compression behavior and energy absorption capacity of stiffened syntactic foam core sandwich composites

Abstract

Phenolic syntactic foam sandwich composites are potential materials for aerospace and marine applications because of their good strength to weight ratio, stiffness to weight ratio, fire resistance and better energy absorption characteristics. In the present work, syntactic foam is prepared by uniform mixing of cenosphere and phenolic resin in equal proportions. The effect of stiffening the syntactic foam core by resin impregnated paper honeycomb (RIPH) structure on compression behavior and energy absorption capacity of sandwich composites is experimentally investigated under flatwise and edgewise loading configuration. Bare RIPH core and only syntactic foam core sandwich composites are also investigated for comparison purpose. The results show that RIPH incorporated syntactic foam has the highest compressive properties and energy absorption capacity compared to only syntactic foam core sandwich composites. Microscopic features of syntactic foam fragments tested under flatwise compression are also investigated to predict the failure mode.

Keywords

Syntactic foam honeycomb structure sandwich composite compression behavior energy absorption

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Zhou

Hill

. Impact damage and energy-absorbing characteristics and residual in-plane compressive strength of honeycomb sandwich panels. J Sandwich Struct Mater 2009; 11: 329–356.

Paik

Thayamballi

Kim

. The strength characteristics of aluminum honeycomb sandwich panels. Thin Walled Struct 1999; 35: 205–231.

Heimbs

Schmeer

Middendorf

Maier

. Strain rate effects in phenolic composites and phenolic-impregnated honeycomb structures. Compos Sci Technol 2007; 67: 2827–2837.

Foo

Seah

Chai

. Low-velocity impact failure of aluminium honeycomb sandwich panels. Compos Struct 2008; 85: 20–28.

Cai

Miyano

Nakada

. Prediction of long term flexural fatigue strength of honeycomb sandwich composites. J Reinf Plast Compos 2010; 29(2): 266–277.

Sezgin

Tanoglu

Egilmez

. Mechanical behavior of polypropylene-based honeycomb-core composite sandwich structures. J Reinf Plast Compos 2010; 29(10): 1569–1579.

Mouritz

Gardiner

. Compression properties of fire-damaged polymer sandwich composites. Composites Part A 2002; 33: 609–620.

Rizov

. Elastic–plastic response of structural foams subjected to localized static loads. Mater Des 2006; 27: 947–954.

Flores Johnson

Mines

RAW

. Degradation of elastic modulus of progressively-crushable foams in uniaxial compression. J Cell Plast 2008; 44(5): 415–434.

10.

Zhou

Hassan

Guan

Wesley

. The low velocity impact response of foam-based sandwich panels. Compos Sci Technol 2012; 72: 1781–1790.

11.

Zhou

Guan

Cantwell

. The impact response of graded foam sandwich structures. Compos Struct 2013; 97: 370–377.

12.

Vaidya

Ulven

Pillay

. Impact damage of partially foam-filled co-injected honeycomb core sandwich composites. J Compos Mater 2003; 37(7): 611–626.

13.

Gustin

Joneson

Mahinfalah

. Low velocity impact of combination Kevlar/carbon fiber sandwich composites. Compos Struct 2005; 69: 396–406.

14.

Raju

Reddy

Narasimha Swamy

. Repair effectiveness studies on impact damaged sandwich composite constructions. J Reinf Plast Compos 2006; 25(1): 5–16.

15.

Gupta

Woldesenbetb

Mensah

. Compression properties of syntactic foams: effect of cenosphere radius ratio and specimen aspect ratio. Composites Part A 2004; 35: 103–111.

16.

Gupta

Woldesenbet

. Characterization of flexural properties of syntactic foam core sandwich composites and effect of density variation. J Compos Mater 2005; 39: 2197–2212.

17.

Shivakumar

Argade

Sadler

. Processing and properties of a lightweight fire resistant core material for sandwich structures. J Adv Mater 2006; 38(1): 1–17.

18.

Zhang

Zhao

. Mechanical response of Al matrix syntactic foams produced by pressure infiltration casting. J Compos Mater 2007; 41: 2105–2117.

19.

Zhang

. Processing and characterization of syntactic carbon foams containing hollow carbon microspheres. Carbon 2009; 47: 1451–1456.

20.

Gupta

Porfiri

. Comparison of tensile and compressive characteristics of vinyl ester/glass microballoon syntactic foams. Composites Part B 2010; 41(3): 236–245.

21.

Jhaver

Tippur

. Characterization and modeling of compression behavior of syntactic foam-filled honeycombs. J Reinf Plast Compos 2010; 29(21): 3185–3196.

22.

Samsuddin

Ariff

Zakaria

. Development and characterization of epoxy syntactic foam filled with epoxy hollow spheres. eXPRESS Polym Lett 2011; 5(7): 653–660.

23.

Swetha

Kumar

. Quasi-static uni-axial compression behaviour of hollow glass microspheres/epoxy based syntactic foams. Mater Des 2011; 32: 4152–4163.

24.

Tao

Zhao

. Compressive failure of Al alloy matrix syntactic foams manufactured by melt infiltration. Mater Sci Eng A 2012; 549: 228–232.

25.

Anne

Norman

Michael

. Energy absorption of foam-filled circular tubes with braided composite walls. Eur J Mech A/Solids 2000; 19: 31–50.

26.

Gupta

Nagorny

. Tensile properties of glass microballoon-epoxy resin syntactic foams. J Appl Polym Sci 2006; 102(2): 1254–1261.

27.

Gupta

Kishore Sankaran

. On the characterization of syntactic foam core sandwich composites for compressive properties. J Reinf Plast Compos 1999; 18: 1347–1357.

28.

Ismail

. Energy absorption of foam-filled steel extrusion under quasistatic oblique loading. Int J Engg Technol 2008; 5(1): 11–24.

29.

Shivakumar

Swaminathan

Sharpe

. Carbon/vinyl ester composites for enhanced performance in marine applications. J Reinf Plast Compos 2006; 25(10): 1101–1116.