Flexural behaviour of cementitious composites embedded with 3D printed re-entrant chiral auxetic meshes

Abstract

3D printed auxetic metamaterials can be used to make high performing cementitious composites to strengthen existing structures and elements due to their negative Poisson’s ratio behaviour and high energy absorbing characteristics. In this paper, three different re-entrant chiral auxetic (RCA) meshes of various cell geometries and orientations were developed by 3D printing them using poly-lactic acid (PLA) and thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) filament. The developed meshes were tested under out-of-plane flexure to study their load carrying capacity, ductility and energy absorption characteristics, especially to characterise the best cell orientation. The horizontal cells provided enhanced load carrying and energy absorption characteristics for all three cell geometries for both materials. These RCA meshes were then embedded into low and high strength premix cement mortar matrices to develop auxetic cementitious composites (ACCs). In total, 42 ACC specimens were casted and tested under flexural loading. The results were studied in terms of their failure patterns, load-displacement responses, flexural capacities, ductility and energy absorption. The RCA meshes made of PLA filament showed limited capacity and energy absorption as compared to RCA meshes made of TPU filament due to extended flexibility and resilience provided by TPU meshes. The RCA meshes with a denser cell structure exhibited highest flexural capacity and effective energy absorption of 14 700 kJ m−2 for TPU-RCA mesh embedded into high strength cement mortar matrix. The results obtained in this study have enabled to understand the flexural behaviour of cementitious composites embedded with 3D printed auxetic lattices and to strengthen the existing structures.