Paper 8: Design etc Handout #2 Metallic Foams Lecturer: Deshpande Cambridge University Easter: 2002 The design of sandwich panels with foam cores 1 Introduction Structural members made up of two stiff, strong skins separated by a lightweight core are known as sandwich panels. The separation of the core increases the moment of area of the panel with little increase in weight producing an efficient structure for resisting bending and buckling loads. Because of this sandwich panels are often used in applications where weight saving is critical, example ¢ Aircraft structures, floor panels and helicopter rotor blades © Sporting equipment Typically, skins of sandwich panels are made from Aluminium or fibre composites and cores are made of Aluminium or paper honeycombs. More recently metal and polymer foams are also used. Nature too makes use of sandwich design. Sections through the skull of a human and the wing of a bird clearly show a low density core separated by solid faces eP8: Metallic foams In this lecture series we will discuss the stiffness and strength of sand- wich beams and then use the analytical expressions developed to design sandwich panels that can carry a given load at a minimum weight. 2 The stiffness of sandwich beams veth Consider a sandwich beam of uniform wight b, with two identical face sheets of thickness ¢ perfectly bonded to the foam core of thickness c. The beam is loaded in 3-point bending as sketched below with a span L between the supports and a overhang H. ae? em H | £ a Let Ey and E, be the Young’s moduli of the face sheets and core, respec- tively. The stresses and deflections in a beam of this kind may be found, to a first approximation, by the use of ordinary theory of bending, Re- 2-2P8: Metallic foams = _ ysd: 2002 call that this theory is based on the assumption that cross-sections which are plane and perpendicular to the longitudinal azis of the unloaded beam remain so when bending takes place. This assumption leads to the well known relation between the bending moment M and the curvature (1/R) Mes -t EL R where the negative sign is introduced to comply with usual sign conven- tions. EJ is the flexural rigidity which in a homogeneous beam is the product of the elastic moduli E and the second moment of area I. For a sandwich beam the equivalent flexural rigidity (ET)eq consists of the sum of the rigidities of the faces and core measured about the centroidal (neutral) axis dr’ gf the entire cross-section — (EDene = &, gb? (Pde woke E, © 1¢5can be calculated from the parallel axis theorem T pecs = 2 [Eyret Aan, cy] = 2afee® 4 bed?) re = where d= (c+). Thus, (Eleq = 2 3 Eybt§ e Eybtd’ 4 Bebe @n) 6 2 12 The deflection of the beam can then be calculated by modifying the Struc- 23