Numerical study on the impact-induced failure mechanism of cylindrical glass projectile using the FEM-SPH conversion method

Abstract

Brittle materials have been used for projectiles in recent years. To investigate the failure mechanism of glass cylinder during the impact, a light gas gun was adopted to conduct dynamic experiments on aluminum targets with polyurea coating. The residual glass projectiles collected perform a discrepancy after impacting different sides of the targets. By comparing different numerical method to simulate the experiments, the FEM-SPH adaptively conversion method was validated with significant advantage and reliability, and it was then used to reveal the brittle material failure mechanism. In addition, the effect of different velocities and impact surfaces on glass failure was numerically and theoretically analyzed characterized by the residual mass of elements and corresponding failure mass of particles converted from failure elements. An initial-contact-stress-based equivalent model was proposed to provide analytic and satisfied assessment of the projectile failure extents when impacting different targets. Our findings provide a reliable reference for further revealing the fracture mechanism of brittle materials during impact.