Research project: Thermal degradation of foam cored sandwich structures

Achievements:

• Development of physically based High-Order Sandwich Theory (HOST) models to predict the non-linear thermomechanical response of foam cored sandwich structures
• Development of procedures to conduct accurate and reliable Finite element Analyses (FEA) of the thermo-mechanical response of foam cored sandwich structures
• Accurate measurement of polymer foam core properties as function of temperature. This is conducted in-situ in environmental test chamber using advanced non-contact full field methods, incl. Digital Image Correllation (DIC) and Infrared Thermography
• Full-scale experimental characterization of non-linear thermo-mechanical including loss of stability
• Approximate closed-form solution for wrinkling of sandwich panels subjected to thermomechanical loading 

Significance of work & Navy relevance

• The combined experimental investigations and numerical simulations conducted in this research program aims to develop a quantitative understanding of the complex phenomena involved
• The research has resulted will develop validated predictive tools to be used for design and optimization of advanced composite sandwich structures for naval applications

A poster with more details about the project is available in pdf format under Useful Downloads.