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The University of Southampton
Southampton Marine and Maritime Institute

Water Impact of Flexible Composite Hull Structures Seminar

Time:
12:00 - 13:00
Date:
30 April 2013
Venue:
Southampton University Highfield Campus Building 28, Room 2001

For more information regarding this seminar, please telephone Dr. Yeping Xiong on +44(0)023 80596619 or email Y.Xiong@soton.ac.uk .

Event details

The Centre for Advanced Composite Materials is a multidisciplinary centre at the University of Auckland, with staff and students from the Departments of Mechanical Engineering, Polymer Science, Engineering Science and Medicine. Research areas include development of new synthetic and bio-based composite materials, improved manufacturing technologies for thermoset and thermoplastic composites, and simulation and characterisation of structural performance. Mark will give an overview of the Centre’s research areas, then describe research related to water slamming impact of flexible composite panels.

This work focused on the loading and responses of flexible hull panels during slamming events. A series of single skin and sandwich composite panels with varying flexural and transverse shear rigidities have been subjected to constant velocity impacts up to 6.0 m/s with deadrise angles of 10◦, 20◦ and 30◦ using a purpose built testing facility. The results from these tests have been compared to previous experimental work undertaken on a nominally rigid panel and to a range of analytical theories for the prediction of the loads and pressures acting on a rigid wedge, enabling the hydroelastic effects during slamming of flexible structures to be characterised.

Significant decreases in peak pressure at the centre of the panel of up to 50% were observed, while pressures at the outer edge of the panel increased by up to 100%. These are believed to be predominately caused by kinematic changes to panel local velocity and shape during the impact. Previous inertial based hydroelasticity onset theories are not supported by the experimental data, with the greatest effect of inertial effects occurring at the lowest impact velocities. Strains in the long direction of the panel of up to 50% of the strain in the short direction have been recorded at the centre of the panel, illustrating the importance of considering a rectangular panel undergoing slamming impacts as three dimensional. Transverse shear force at the outer edges of the panel was characterised and shown to be significantly higher than that predicted from traditional design methods.

Speaker information

Dr Mark Battley, University of Auckland, New Zealand. Mark completed his PhD at the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Auckland in 1993. He then worked as a composites research engineer at Industrial Research Limited (A New Zealand government research laboratory) and at the Department of Lightweight Structures, Royal Institute of Technology Stockholm, before joining the Centre for Advanced Composite Materials in 2006, where he is currently the Deputy Director. His research interests include numerical modelling and experimental characterisation of polymer composite materials and structures, particularly failure mechanisms, design methodologies, transient behaviour, and mechanical testing methods for materials and structures.

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