Quasi-static axial crushing of hexagonal origami crash boxes as energy absorption devices

Zhong You,Lin Yuan,Yan Chen,Jiayao Ma,Mengyan Shi,Huaping Dai

doi:10.5194/ms-10-133-2019

Abstract

Abstract. Thin-walled tubes are widely used as energy absorption devices for their low cost and high manufacturability. Introduction of the origami technique enables the tube to follow a pre-determined failure mode and to improve its energy absorption efficiency. This paper examines the energy absorption characteristics of the origami crash box under quasi-static axial crushing. Both experimental and numerical results show that the origami pattern develops a diamond-shaped mode, bringing a reduction in initial peak force and a significant increase in energy absorption compared to the conventional hexagonal tube. The sensitivity of its energy absorption performance to various parameters is studied, and it is shown to achieve 68.29 % increase in the specific energy absorption and 13.91 % reduction in the initial peak force in the optimal case. Furthermore, an analytical solution is presented for the energy absorption, which achieves reasonable agreement with the numerical results.

Highlights

Thin-walled tubes have been widely employed as energy absorption devices because of their excellent mechanical properties, high manufacturability and low cost (Lu and Yu, 2003)
The finished origami crash box can be found in panel (e). (4) As a final point, in order to release the residual stress created during folding (Ding et al, 1992), the specimen was heat treated for 8 min at a temperature of 500 ◦C
Good agreement can be found between the experiments and the numerical simulation for both HEX and CB-30-155

Summary

Introduction

Thin-walled tubes have been widely employed as energy absorption devices because of their excellent mechanical properties, high manufacturability and low cost (Lu and Yu, 2003). To estimate the energy absorption of square tubes, Wierzbicki and Abramowicz (1983) proposed a super folding element theory. Later, this theory was further improved by taking the effective crushing distance into account (Abramowicz, 1983). The study of polygonal tubes, which are widely used in practical applications, received much attention. Circular tubes can absorb more energy than polygonal and square tubes, but they have a high peak force, which is not suitable for an energy absorption device

Methods

Results

Conclusion