Dynamic response of honeycomb cored sandwich panels under high velocity impact: A numerical study

Abstract

To investigate the impact resisting behavior of honeycomb cored sandwich panel under the bullet attacks, birds and debris, computational analysis of ballistic impact tests have been performed. The honeycomb sandwich panel with SS 316L front and back sheets are used owing to its better impact resistance, high ductility and superior strength for impact resisting applications. The Ballistic test simulations under a wide range of 150 to 800 m/s have been carried out on a SS 316L sandwich panel embedded with Aluminum alloy (AA 3003) honeycomb core using ABAQUS/Explicit software. For this, 12 mm thick sandwich panel and three types of bullet profiles namely conical, hemispherical and blunt are considered. The initial and residual velocity obtained from the simulation is used for computing the dynamic energy absorption of the panels. The significance of projectile velocity, nose shape on overall energy absorption capacity of the panel have been thoroughly investigated. The sandwich panel reportedly absorbed 20.6% and 41.2% higher energy when impacted with blunt projectile than those impacted with hemispherical and conical bullets. Moreover, an almost linear increase in the overall energy absorption capacity of the panel have been observed by increasing the striking sheet thickness.