Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411

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Composites: Part A
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compositesa

A CaO enhanced rubberized syntactic foam

Jones Nji a, Guoqiang Li a,b,*
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA
b
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Southern University, Baton Rouge, LA 70813, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this study, a calcium oxide (CaO) enhanced rubberized syntactic foam was developed by incorporating
Received 15 January 2008 CaO powder into a rubber latex/microballoon mixture, in order to effectively and efficiently remove the
Received in revised form 2 May 2008 water contained in the rubber latex in a controlled manner. It was expected that an exothermic reaction
Accepted 5 May 2008
between CaO and water would be generated, which would result in the removal of water from the mix-
ture and would leave behind glass microballoons coated by a calcium hydroxide (Ca(OH)2) reinforced
rubber layer. In order to validate this idea, a new manufacturing procedure was proposed. Low velocity
Keywords:
impact and four-point bending tests were performed on pure foam and the foam cored sandwich beams.
A. Foam
B. Impact behavior
Scanning electron microscopy was used to examine the existence and uniformity of the rubber coating
B. Microstructure and X-ray diffractometry was employed to validate the presence of Ca(OH)2. Compared with the previous
B. Damage tolerance results without CaO [Li G, Jones N. Development of rubberized syntactic foam. Compos Pt A: Appl Sci
Manuf 2007;38:1483–92], the current foam showed a much higher residual strength with a slight reduc-
tion in impact tolerance. The SEM observation showed a uniform rubber coating on the microballoons
and the X-ray diffractometry confirmed the existence of Ca(OH)2 crystal in the rubber coating layer. In
order to reveal the underlying principle for the enhancement, a micromechanical model based on the
equivalent medium theorem was proposed and a finite element analysis using ANSYS was conducted.
It was found that the rubber coating on the microballoons significantly reduced the stress concentration
and improved the stress distribution; the presence of the Ca(OH)2 crystals in the rubber layer further
reduced the stress concentration. A compressive stress zone ahead of or in the vicinity of the crack tip
in the rubberized syntactic foam helps in blunting and arresting the microcrack from propagating into
macrocrack.
Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction The impact energy absorption was found to be primarily through

Syntactic foams are a class of structural materials obtained by
dispersing microballoons into a polymer or metallic matrix. They
are close-celled foams containing microscopic porosity in an en-
closed space. The history of polymeric matrix syntactic foams da-
ted back to the 1950–1960s. They were developed for the use in
marine structures, autos, aircraft, transportation, and construction
[2,3]. Since 1990s, syntactic foams have gained new momentum
partly due to the increased application of composite sandwich
structures in various civilian and military structures. However, it
has been found that conventional thermoset resin based syntactic
foams such as epoxy based syntactic foam are very brittle due to
the chemical and physical cross-linked rigid 3D network of poly-
mer matrix and the brittleness of the glass microspheres [1,4–8].
* Corresponding author. Address: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Lou-
isiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA. Tel.: +1 225 578 5302; fax: +1
225 578 5924.
E-mail address: guoli@me.lsu.edu (G. Li).
macrolength-scale damage [1,8].
In a previous study [1], a rubberized hybrid syntactic foam for
composite sandwich structures was proposed, developed and char-
acterized in terms of impact energy dissipation/absorption capac-
ity and damage tolerance. It was formed by dispersing rubber
coated microballoons into a microfiber and nanoclay reinforced
epoxy matrix. It was expected that the impact energy would be ab-
sorbed through microlength-scale damage. The impact test results
showed that this was exactly the case. The impact energy absorp-
tion was primarily by matrix microcracking, mciroballoon crush-
ing, microfiber pull-out, and microfiber bridge-over. The rubber
coating served as a mechanism for creating microcracks; it also
served as a mechanism for blunting, containing, and arresting the
microcracks from propagating into macroscopic cracks. The resid-
ual bending strength test showed that, while the incorporation of
rubber reduced the bending strength of the foam, the post-impact
residual strength of the rubberized foam cored sandwich was
much higher than the conventional syntactic foam cored counter-
parts. Therefore, it was concluded that this novel foam would have

1359-835X/$ - see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.compositesa.2008.05.001
 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411
a potential to be used as a core material for sandwich structures
under impact incidents.
Although the performance of the rubberized foams was supe-
rior to conventional syntactic foam without rubber coating, the
fabrication procedure was too time consuming and difficult to con-
trol. In that study, gentle heating and continuous stirring of the
rubber latex/glass microballoon mixture was employed during fab-
rication to evaporate the water. Thus, there is a need to improve
the fabricating process so that the water can be removed more
effectively and efficiently in a controlled manner.
In this study, we propose to use calcium oxide to remove the
water contained in the rubber latex. The underlying idea here is
to generate an exothermic reaction within the rubber latex/glass
microballoon mixture by incorporating calcium oxide which will
react with water to form calcium hydroxide. Also, the heat energy
released from the reaction would be utilized to further evaporate
water from the mixture, leaving behind microballoons coated by
calcium hydroxide reinforced rubber layer. It is expected that the
reinforcement of the rubber by calcium hydroxide may further en-
hance the mechanical strength of the syntactic foam.
It is worth mentioning that it has been qualitatively shown that
the rubber coating layer may reduce the stress concentration in the
rubberized syntactic foam. However, this has not been proved
quantitatively. Additionally, the effect of the existence of calcium
hydroxide in the rubber layer needs to be quantified. Therefore,
the objective of this study is two-fold: (1) to fabricate and test
the new rubberized syntactic foam and (2) to reveal the underlying
principle governing the improvement in mechanical properties by
using a micromechanical model and finite element analysis.
2. Experimentation
2.1. Raw materials
Styrene–butadiene rubber (SBR) latex – Rovene 4021 (density:
1.0 g/cm3, solid content: 50%) from Mallard Creek polymers, Q-
cel 6048 glass microballoons (average particle size: 50 lm, maxi-
mum particle size: 70 lm, specific density: 0.48 g/cm3) from Pot-
ters Industries Incorporation, milled glass fibers (average length:
1.6 mm, diameter: 15.8 lm, density: 2.5 g/cm3) from Fiberglast
Developments Corporation, DER 332 epoxy (density: 1.16 g/cm3)
cured with a DEH 24 (density: 0.95 g/cm3) in a ratio of 85:15 by
volume from DOW Chemicals, calcium oxide (density: 3.25 g/
cm3) from Fischer Scientific, woven roving glass fabric (density:
2.54 g/cm3) from fiberglast and allyl glycedyl ether (density:
0.96 g/cm3) as diluting agent from Fischer scientific, were utilized
to prepare the new rubberized syntactic foam.
In order to determine the amount of CaO needed, we need to
know the chemical reaction. The exothermic reaction between cal-
cium oxide (CaO) and water (H2O) to form calcium hydroxide
(Ca(OH)2) is shown below [9]:
CaOðsÞ þ H2 OðlÞ ¼ CaðOHÞ2ðsÞ  65:3 kJ
56:1 g þ 18 g ¼ 74:1 g
One mole of CaO reacts with 1 mol of H2O to produce 1 mol of
Ca(OH)2 (or 56.1 g of CaO react with 18 g of H2O to form 74.1 g of
Ca(OH)2), releasing 65.3 kJ of heat energy, which is greater than
the heat of vaporization of 1 mol of water (40.65 kJ/mol) [9]. From
the balanced chemical equation between calcium oxide and water
to produce calcium hydroxide, the relationship between water and
calcium oxide has been clearly established. Thus based on the quan-
tity of water in a given system, the amount of calcium oxide required
to completely consume the water can be determined. For example, if
18 g of water require 56.1 g of calcium oxide, then 50 g of water will
need (56.1 g  50 g)/18 g = 155.8 g of calcium oxide.
1405
It is noted that while the above chemical reaction can fully con-
sume the water contained in the rubber latex, it was found that it
could only be used as a guide. The reason for this is that when the
CaO was incorporated as indicated in the equation, the rubber/
microballoon mixture became too dry and clustered to work. By
a trial and error process, it was found that 37% of the CaO deter-
mined by the above equation was able to remove a part of the
water and retained the workability of the mixture without cluster-
ing. Of course, there was some water remained. The remaining
water was removed by the internal heat produced during the
chemical reaction. As indicated in the above equation, the heat
produced was sufficient to evaporate all the water contained. Be-
cause the heat was produced internally, it was much more efficient
and controllable than externally heating the mixture, as was done
in the previous study [1].
2.2. Foam fabrication procedure
The procedure for fabricating the CaO enhanced rubberized hy-
brid syntactic foam is outlined below:
(1) Hollow glass beads and rubber latex were mixed properly by
mechanical stirring.
(2) Calcium oxide was added to (1), about 25 g every 3 min
while stirring. (Caution: The mixture should not be allowed
to stand undisturbed; otherwise heat may build up and
begin to cause the rubber to cluster.)
(3) Meanwhile, epoxy A and milled glass fibers were mixed
together in a separate beaker.
(4) Hardener was added to (3) and mixed properly.
(5) Finally, (2) and (4) were combined together, mixed properly
to uniformity with an electronic mixer; the mixture was
then poured into an aluminum mold and cured at room tem-
perature for 12 h (diluting agent was added to improve
workability).
After curing at room temperature, the foam plates were further
cured at 150 °F for 6 h and at 250 °F for 2 h. This post-curing was
implemented to ensure complete curing of the epoxy.
2.3. Specimen preparation
In the previous study [1], the Group 4, i.e., with 10% by vol-
ume of rubber was found to be the best in terms of impact tol-
erance and residual strength among all the seven groups
investigated. In order to compare with the best syntactic foam
found in the previous study, almost the same composition as
Group 4 was used in fabricating the new syntactic foam. Table
1 gives the volume fractions of each constituent in the new syn-
tactic foam. From Table 1, it is seen that the content of epoxy,
rubber, and milled glass fiber is slightly higher than that of
Group 4. Because it was found that the nanoclay did not en-
hance the mechanical properties of Group 4 considerably, it
was not used in the new syntactic foam.
A total of 12 beam specimens with dimensions identical to
those of the specimens in [1] were prepared. The 12 specimens
were divided into six pure foam core specimens and six sandwich
specimens. Sandwich plates were prepared by sandwiching the
foam plates in between single layer E-glass plain woven roving fab-
ric reinforced epoxy skins per the Vacuum Assisted Resin Infusion
Molding (VARIM) system. The sandwich plates were cured at room
temperature for 12 h. The cured thickness of the skins was
0.738 mm. Once cured, the composite plates were machined down
to dimensions as described in [1] (304.8 mm  150.8 mm 
15.2 mm). Fig. 1 shows three foam core specimens (left) and three
sandwich specimens (right).
1406 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411

Table 1
Volume fraction of constituents (%)

Group Epoxy Microballoon Rubber Milled glass fibers Nanoclay Calcium oxide
C10%R 43.0 41.7 10.7 2.7 – 1.9
Group 4 [1] 40.0 45.0 10.0 2.5 2.5 –

rate of 4.4 mm/min. Scanning electron microscopy was conducted

to confirm the presence of rubber coating on the glass microbal-
loons using Hitachi S3600-N scanning electron microscope. Cop-
per-K1 alpha X-ray diffraction analyses were performed using
Siemens kristalloflex and Jade 6.1 software to confirm the presence
of calcium hydroxide crystals in the foam.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Impact test results

3.1.1. Pure foam cores

Fig. 1. A group of pure foam (left) and sandwich beams (right).
2.4. Experiment
Two types of tests were conducted as described in [1]. The first
one was a low velocity impact test using the DynaTup 8250HV im-
pact machine with a hemispherical tup nose of diameter of
12.7 mm and a hammer weight of 3.4 kg. The impact velocity
was 3 m/s. The second test was a four-point bending test using
the MTS 810 machine with a span length of 254 mm and a loading
Fig. 2 shows typical load–time and energy–time responses of a
pure foam core specimen of the currently fabricated foam (C10%R).
Table 2 summarizes the initiation energy and propagation energy
obtained from impact tests. As discussed in [1], initiation energy
is basically an indication of the capacity for a target to transfer en-
ergy elastically and propagation energy is basically a measurement
of the energy absorbed by the target during gross damage creation
and propagation. Generally, a higher initiation energy and lower
propagation energy are an indication of higher impact tolerance.
From Table 2, it can be seen that the current foam has a slightly
lower initiation energy and a slightly higher propagation energy as
compared with the best foam (Group 4, 10% rubber content) ob-
tained in [1]. The lower initiation energy suggests that the foam
transfers a lesser amount of impact energy (compared with Group
4) into elastic strain energy before incurring gross damage. The
higher propagation energy, on the other hand, suggests that more
energy is absorbed in the form of gross damage initiation and prop-
agation. The reason for the slightly reduced impact tolerance can

Fig. 2. Typical load and energy traces of the developed foam core specimen.
 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411 1407

Table 2
Impact test results of pure foam core specimens

Group name Average initiation energy (J) STD Average propagation energy (J) STD
C10%R 3.53 0.09 9.53 0.05
Group 4 [1] 3.70 0.21 8.80 0.70

be explained as follow. Firstly, the new syntactic foam contains a Table 3

Impact test results of sandwich specimens
slightly higher amount of epoxy (see Table 1), which increases
the brittleness of the foam. On the other hand, the slightly reduced Group name Initiation energy (J) STD Propagation energy (J) STD
microballoon content may reduce the number of mechanisms for C10%R 11.48 0.89 1.73 0.93
energy absorption in microlength scale because microballoon Group 4 [1] 13.30 0.01 0.60 0.02
crushing has been found to be a mechanism for energy absorption.
Secondly, the incorporation of Ca(OH)2 in the rubber layer may re-
duce the ductility of the rubber, leading to a reduction in energy
7000
absorption in microlength-scale.
6000
3.1.2. Sandwich beams
Fig. 3 shows typical load–time and energy–time responses of a 5000
sandwich specimen using the newly fabricated foam as core. Table
4000
3 gives the initiation energy and propagation energy obtained. Pure core

Load (N)
Impacted sandwich
From Table 3, the same trend that was seen in the pure foam
3000 Unimpacted sandwich
core is observed. Group C10%R (the newly developed foam) shows
a lower initiation energy and higher propagation energy than that 2000
of the Group 4 in the previous study. It is expected that the slightly
reduced impact tolerance may lead to a higher rate of reduction in 1000
residual strength. This was validated through four-point bending
0
test.

3.2. Four-point bending test results 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

Fig. 4 shows the typical load–displacement curves of pure foam
core, sandwich and impacted sandwich beam specimens of the
newly fabricated foam. Table 4 summarizes the peak bending load
values of the pure foam core, sandwich and impacted sandwich
specimens of the currently fabricated foam (C10%R) and those of
Group 4 [1].
Displacement (mm)
Fig. 4. Bending load–deflection curves of pure core, impacted sandwich and
unimpacted sandwich specimens of the currently developed foam.
From Table 4, it can be seen that the peak load values of the
pure foam core, sandwich and impacted sandwich beam specimens

Fig. 3. Typical load and energy traces of a C10%R foam cored sandwich beam.
1408 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411

Table 4
Peak load values of pure foam core, sandwich and impacted sandwich specimens (N)

Group number Pure foam core Sandwich Impacted sandwich

Average Standard deviation Average Standard deviation Average Standard deviation
C10%R 939 46 5848 367 5377 332
Group 4 [1] 280 34 4529 313 4555 19

of the newly developed foam (C10%R) are all much higher than
those of Group 4. This suggests that the newly developed syntactic
foam not only has a more controlled way to remove the contained
water, it also enhances the load carrying capacity of the foam and
the foam cored sandwich. The enhanced bending strength is obvi-
ously desired in structural applications.
Just as expected, the impact has reduced the residual strength
of the foam cored sandwich beams. For the newly developed foam
(C10%R), the reduction is 8%, while a slight increase (0.6%) was
found for Group 4 [1]. This result is in agreement with the impact
test results. As given in Tables 2 and 3, the newly developed foam
and foam cored sandwich have a slightly lower impact tolerance
than that of Group 4. In Group 4, more impact energy was dissi-
pated in the form of elastic strain energy and kinetic energy, while
slightly more energy was dissipated in the form of damage in the
newly developed foam.
Although the impact tolerance of the newly developed foam is
not as good as the Group 4, it is still better than the conventional
syntactic foam and pure epoxy. As given in [1], Group 1, which
was a conventional syntactic foam with 40% by volume of epoxy
and 60% by volume of microballoons, saw a reduction of 18% in
bending strength after the same impact; for Group 7, which was
a pure epoxy, saw a reduction of 45% in residual bending strength.

3.3. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) observation

Hitachi S-3600N scanning electron microscope was used to ana-

lyse fractured surfaces of the foam (Group C10%R) in order to verify
the presence of rubber coating layer on the microballoons. Fig. 5a
and b shows the fractured surfaces of a conventional syntactic
foam and the newly developed syntactic foam, respectively. Obvi-
ously, the microballons were coated with a rubber layer in the
newly developed syntactic foam. Some microcracks were created
on the Ca(OH)2 reinforced rubber layer after impact. These micro-
cracks served as mechanisms of absorbing impact energy. It is
noted that this type of microcracks was not found in the Group 4
specimen [1], indicating that the incorporation of Ca(OH)2 in-
creased the stiffness and reduced the ductility of the rubber layer.
Fig. 5. SEM pictures showing (a) uncoated microballoon for conventional syntactic
In Fig. 5b, microfiber pull-out was also observed, which served as
foam and (b) rubber coated microballoons for the developed syntactic foam.
mechanisms of absorbing impact energy in microlength-scale.
Similar mechanisms were also found in Group 4 [1].
hydroxide crystals, Copper-K1 alpha X-ray (wave length
3.4. X-ray diffraction analysis 0.154056 nm) analyses were performed on a powder sample of
the currently fabricated foam (C10%R) using Siemens kristalloflex
From the above study, it is seen that the incorporation of with Jade 6.1 software. The scan was done from 0° to 61.18° at a
Ca(OH)2 crystals in the rubber layer has a significant effect on im- scan rate of 0.02° per second. Table 5 is a summary of the crystal(s)
pact tolerance and residual strength. It is thus desired to validate (phases) present in the sample. Fig. 6 shows the diffraction pattern
its existence. Because SEM cannot identify the presence of calcium (refined) that was obtained. Crystals of portlandite (calcium

Table 5
X-ray diffraction results
2-h Measured interplanar Height I (%h) (counts) Phase ID Standard interplanar I (%h) (h k l) 2-h Delta (d1  d2)
spacing d1 (nm) (counts) spacing d2 (nm) (nm)
18.18 0.48757 33 75.0 Portlandite 0.49000 74 (0 0 1) 18.089 0.091
34.082 0.26285 44 100.0 Portlandite 0.26280 100 (1 0 1) 34.088 0.006
50.839 0.17945 19 43.2 Portlandite 0.17960 36 (1 1 0) 50.794 0.045
 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411 1409

100
CH (001)
80
Intensity (Counts)

CH (101)
60

40
CH (110)

20

0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
2-Theta

Fig. 6. X-ray diffraction pattern obtained from a powder sample of the developed
foam.

hydroxide) were identified, confirming the presence of calcium

hydroxide crystals in the foam.

3.5. Finite element analysis

3.5.1. Model
Finite element plane-stress analyses were conducted quantita-
tively using ANSYS version 11.0 in order to understand how the
rubber coating layers on glass microballoons and the calcium
hydroxide crystals affect the stress concentration and distribution
Fig. 7. Micromechanics model. (a) Conventional syntactic foam without coating, (b)
within the rubberized syntactic foams. Micromechanical modeling
previous rubberized syntactic foam [1], and (c) newly developed syntactic foam.
based on the equivalent medium theorem has been widely used in
modeling particulate-filled composite materials [10]. In this type of
analyses, the particulate composite was modeled as a particle or
Table 6
several particles embedded in an equivalent medium. Both analyt- Properties of the different constituents
ical modeling with one particle and finite element analysis with
Material Epoxy Glass Rubber Ca(OH)2
several particles have been conducted [8,11]. In this study, a
plane-stress body with five particles in a pattern similar to face Elastic modulus (GPa) 3.5 [9] 70 [9] 0.10 [9] 2.2 [12,13]
Poisson ratio 0.35 0.20 0.49 0.20
centered cubic (FCC) was considered. A total of three models were
created as shown in Fig. 7a–c. In Fig. 7a, a conventional syntactic
foam was considered as a control; in Fig. 7b, the rubberized syntac-
tic foam (Group 4 in [1]) was considered; in Fig. 7c, the newly
developed syntactic foam was considered. The microballoon radius Ca(OH)2, its modulus and Poisson’s ratio was estimated using the
was taken to be the maximum (35 lm) because it was found that rule-of-mixture’s method [14]. The modulus was found to be
the maximum particle size created the maximum stress concentra- 0.65 GPa and the Poisson’s ratio was found to be 0.45.
tion [11]. It was assumed that the rubber layer or the Ca(OH)2 rein- It is noted that, in order to avoid stress singularity, the hollow
forced rubber layer was uniformly coated on the surface of the glass beads were modified during the modeling. The microballoons
microballoon and the coating thickness was constant. Therefore, were transformed to equivalent solid spheres.
the thickness of the coating layer can be found from the following Assuming that the equivalent solid glass bead has the same
equation: Poisson’s ratio and the same outer diameter as the microballoon,
and they were subjected to the same external hydrostatic pressure,
4
3
pr 3 Vg the modulus of elasticity of the equivalent solid glass bead was
¼
ð4pr 2 Þðtr Þ Vr determined by equating the radial displacement of the equivalent
sphere to the radial displacement of the microballoon. Based on
where Vg is the volume fraction of the glass microballoons, Vr is the
previous studies [10,11], the effective modulus of elasticity of the
volume fraction of rubber or a sum of the rubber and Ca(OH)2 for
equivalent solid glass bead can be found by
the newly developed syntactic foam, and tr is the thickness of the
coating layer. The thickness of the rubber layer used for Group 4 3
Eð1  2mÞðb  a3 Þ
[1] in this analysis was 3.00 lm and the coating was 4.04 lm thick Eeff ¼ 3
ð1  2mÞb þ 0:5ð1 þ mÞa3
in the newly developed syntactic foam.
The dimension for all the three models was 500 lm  500 lm. where Eeff is the effective modulus of elasticity of the equivalent so-
The models were meshed with eight-node plane-stress elements lid glass bead, E and m are, respectively, the modulus of elasticity
(Element Type 82). A total of 7626, 7709, and 7496 elements were and Poisson’s ratio of the microballoon, and a and b are, respec-
used to mesh the models (a)–(c), respectively. The bottom of the tively, the inner and outer radius of the microballoon. Two groups
plane-stress body was fixed for each model and a uniformly dis- of parameters were considered as a comparison. For Group 1, the
tributed tension stress (1 Pa) was applied on the top surface. Elastic parameters considered were a = 0.0 lm (i.e., a solid bead),
modulus and Poisson’s ratio of the different constituents in the b = 35 lm, E = 70 GPa, and m = 0.2; for Group 2, the parameters con-
models are given in Table 6. For the rubber layer reinforced with sidered were a = 24.6 lm, b = 35 lm, E = 70 GPa, and m = 0.2. The
1410 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411

Table 7 the corresponding vertical normal stress distribution. Fig. 10i and
Maximum normal stress in Y-direction and first principal stress ii shows the corresponding vertical normal stress distribution for
Model Normal stress in First principal the model (c).
Y-direction (Pa) stress (Pa) From Table 7 and Figs. 8–10, it is seen that the effect of treating
(a) Conventional Group 1 parameter 2.832 2.843 the microballoon as an equivalent solid sphere leads to minor
syntactic foam Group 2 parameter 2.437 2.437 changes for the stress distribution and for the magnitude of the
(b) Rubberized syntactic Group 1 parameter 2.221 2.221 stresses, which is particularly true for the models (b) and (c). This
foam [1] Group 2 parameter 2.230 2.216 suggests that transforming the hollow microballoon to an equiva-
(c) Newly developed Group 1 parameter 1.343 1.343 lent solid sphere is acceptable.
syntactic foam Group 2 parameter 1.342 1.342 From Table 7, the newly developed syntactic foam has the low-
est stress concentration, followed by the previous rubberized syn-
tactic foam in [1]; the largest stress concentration occurs in the
effective elastic modulus of the equivalent solid glass bead was 70 conventional syntactic foam without rubber coating. It is noted
and 34 GPa for the two groups of parameters, respectively. that the normal stress is almost equal to the first principle stress
for each case because in this 2D model the vertical normal stress
3.5.2. FEM results predominates. Using the conventional syntactic foam as the base-
Table 7 gives the maximum normal stress in the Y-direction line, the vertical normal stress reduction is 21.5% for the previous
(vertical direction) and the first principal stress for the three cases rubberized syntactic foam and 52.6% for the newly developed syn-
with the two groups of parameters. Fig. 8i and ii shows the vertical tactic foam per the Group 1 parameters. The corresponding num-
normal stress distribution for the model (a) corresponding to the ber becomes 8.4% and 44.9% per the Group 2 parameters. The
two Groups of parameters. For the model (b), Fig. 9i and ii shows reduced stress concentration may explain why the rubberized syn-

Fig. 8. Vertical normal stress distribution in model (a). Fig. 9. Vertical normal stress distribution in model (b).
 J. Nji, G. Li / Composites: Part A 39 (2008) 1404–1411
Fig. 10. Vertical normal stress distribution of model (c).
tactic foams have higher capacity to retain their load carrying
capacity than the conventional syntactic foam has. As for the newly
developed syntactic foam and the previous rubberized syntactic
foam in [1], it is clear that the newly developed syntactic foam
has a much lower stress concentration. This may explain why the
residual strength of the former is much higher than that of the lat-
ter. Of course, the lower stress concentration in the newly devel-
oped syntactic foam did not lead to an increased impact
tolerance. The reason for this is that the impact energy dissipation
not only depends on the microscopic stress concentration, which
determines the damage initiation, it also depends on the damage
propagation. Damage propagation is closely related to the stress
distribution.
From Figs. 8–10, it is seen that the stress concentration in the
conventional syntactic foam is very much localized to the central
microballoon. For the other two foams, in particular for the newly
developed syntactic foam, the stress is more uniformly spread into
all the five particles considered. The more uniformly distributed
stress leads to much smaller stress concentration and insures that
all the particles are activated to carry the applied load collabora-
tively. This suggests that the damage is more difficult to initiate
in the newly developed syntactic foam than the previous rubber-
1411
ized syntactic foam. It is interesting to note that the stress in the
conventional syntactic foam is positive or tension everywhere,
which accelerates crack propagation. For the rubberized syntactic
foams, they have regions with negative or compressive stress.
The compressive stress serves to close or arrest the propagating
crack, leading to better impact tolerance. In particular, in the vicin-
ity of each tensile stress concentration spot in the previous rubber-
ized syntactic foam, there is a compressive stress zone, which
serves to more effectively contain the propagating crack. Together
with its slightly higher compressive stress, this may be why the
previous rubberized syntactic foam shows a slightly better impact
tolerance than the currently developed syntactic foam.
4. Conclusion
Based on the analysis and testing, the following conclusions are
obtained:
 The technology for fabricating a novel CaO enhanced hybrid syn-
tactic foam was developed.
 The water contained in the rubber latex was effectively removed
by the chemical reaction and the heat produced during the
chemical reaction.
 Calcium hydroxide crystals in the rubber layer increase the stiff-
ness of the rubber, leading to a slightly reduced impact tolerance
and a much higher increase in the bending strength.
 The FEM shows that the reason for the enhanced residual
strength of the rubberized syntactic foam is due to the reduction
in stress concentration and in more uniform stress distribution;
the presence of Ca(OH)2 in the rubber layer further reduced the
stress concentration. The existence of the compressive stress
zone ahead of or in the vicinity of the tensile stress concentra-
tion spot helps in blunting, containing, and arresting crack prop-
agation, leading to higher impact tolerance.
Acknowledgements
This study is based upon work supported by the US Army Re-
search Office under Grant Number W911NF-05-1-0510 and Louisi-
ana Board of Regents Ph.D. Fellowship in Engineering grant.
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