Performance of Fiber Reinforced High-strength Concrete with Steel Sandwich Composite System as Blast Mitigation Panel

Abstract

The study investigated the response of steel-concrete composite panels subjected to air-blast loading. The composite panels consist of fiber-reinforced high-strength concrete on the incident face, together with a specially configured steel sandwich as the distal layer, which functions to dissipate the imparted blast energy. The performance of the novel composite panel is compared to a conventional steel concrete steel (SCS) panel and an ordinary reinforced concrete panel. The dynamic response of the composite panel is obtained numerically using finite element analysis adopting a simplified modeling approach. Parametric studies are carried out by varying the charge weight, the concrete type, and a number of steel sandwich core structures. Furthermore, the energy absorption capacity is found by calculating the area under the resistance-deflection curve of the proposed composite panel. The relationship between the steel sandwich core structure and the energy absorption capacity, as well as the core design and total panel deflection subjected to various blast charges, are then derived. The combination of fiber reinforced high-strength concrete and cellular steel sandwich demonstrated good potential for use as blast mitigation panel due to the high weight-to-performance ratio and the high energy absorption properties of the composite system.