ABSTRACT
Blasts are a challenge to the safety of humankind, particularly military troops. This necessitates the development of a protective framework in the form of adroit solutions. Cellular structure has been used as an energy-absorbing medium for low-intensity loading conditions for the last few decades. With the need for enhanced damage mitigation, continuous improvement in the design and modeling of such material is required. Metallic honeycomb structures are preferred over other cellular structure groups such as foam and tubes because of higher specific energy absorption and cost-effectiveness. In the case of a near-field blast, where extreme shock waves propagate, the honeycomb structure undergoes rapid deformation. Under such conditions, the deformation behavior of cell wall material is difficult to predict accurately using static deformation mechanics. The current study proposes efficient and precise modeling of aluminum honeycomb structural material and investigates its efficacy for near-field blast conditions. The study emphasizes the energy absorption characteristics of aluminum honeycomb with varying scaled distance and honeycomb parameters such as cell size, core thickness, and wall thickness to cell size ratio (t/L) for the near-field blast. Finally, the effects of cell size geometry on the type of deformation modes and core arrangement of honeycomb sandwich structure under localized blast loading are investigated.
