• Composites Research
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.58-64
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• 2015

The purpose of this paper is to suggest the effective equivalent finite element model for the impact limiter of a nuclear spent fuel shipping cask made of sandwich composite panels. The sandwich composite panels were composed of a metallic facesheet and a core material made of urethane foam, balsa wood and red wood, respectively. The effective equivalent finite element model for the impact limiter was proposed by comparing the results of low-velocity impact test of sandwich panels. An explicit finite element analysis based on LS-DYNA 3D was done in this study. The results showed that the solid elements were recommended to model the facesheet and core of sandwich panels for impact limiter compared to combination modeling method, in which the layered shell element for facesheet and solid element for core material are used. In particular, the solid element for balsa and red wood core materials should be modeled by the element elimination approach.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.36 no.11
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• pp.1335-1343
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• 2012

In this study, the lightweight modular design of hybrid railway carbody structures made of sandwich composites and aluminum extrusions was investigated by using topology and size optimization techniques. The topology optimum design was used to select the best material for parts of the carbody structure at the initial design stage, and then, the size optimum design was used to find the optimal design parameters of hybrid carbody structures using first-order and sub-problem methods. Through the topology optimization analysis, it was found that aluminum extrusions were suitable for primary members such as the underframe and lower side panel module to improve the stiffness and manufacturability of the carbody structures, and sandwich composites were appropriate for secondary members such as the roof and middle side panel module to minimize its weight. Furthermore, the results obtained by size optimization analysis showed that the weight of hybrid carbody structures composed of aluminum extrusions and sandwich composites could be reduced by a maximum of approximately 17.7% in comparison with carbody structures made of only sandwich composites.

• Composites Research
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.77-81
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• 2014

In this study, it was performed damage assessment and repair of small scale aircraft adopted on composite. This aircraft adopted the sandwich structure to skin of wing. This study aims to investigate the residual strength of sandwich composites with nomex honeycomb core and carbon fiber face sheets after the open hole damage by the experimental investigation. The 4-point bending tests were used to find the bending strength, and the open hole was applied to introduce the simulated damage on the specimen. The bending strength test results after open hole were compared with the results of no damaged specimen test. In addition, The damaged composite structure was repaired using external patch repair method after removing damaged area. After that, this study presents comparison results of the experimental investigation between the damaged and the repaired specimen. It was found that the bending strength of repaired specimen was recovered up to 95% of undamaged specimen.

• Composites Research
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.42-50
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• 2007

This paper describes the results of experiments and numerical simulation studies on the low-velocity impact damage of two different sandwich composite panels for application to bodyshell and floor structure of the BIMODAL tram vehicle. Square test samples of 100mm sides were subjected to low-velocity impact loading using an instrumented testing machine at four impact energy levels. Part of this work presented is focused on the finite element analysis of low-velocity impact response onto a sandwich composite panels. It is based on the application of explicit finite element (FE) analysis codes LS-DYNA 3D to study the impact response of sandwich structures under low-velocity impact conditions. Material testing was conducted to determine the input parameters for the metallic and composite material model, and the effective equivalent damage model for the orthotropic honeycomb materials. Numerical and experimental results showed a good agreement for damage area and the depth of indentation of sandwich composite panels created by the impact loading.

• Composites Research
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.384-392
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• 2017

Sandwich panels with three different joint configurations were tested to design a novel sandwich joint structure that can effectively support both the tensile and compressive loads. The sandwich core was mainly aluminum flex honeycomb but the PMI foam core was limitedly applied to the ramp area which is transition part from sandwich to solid laminate. The face of sandwich panel was made of carbon fiber composite. For configuration 1, the composite flange and the sandwich panel were cocured. For configurations 2 and 3, an aluminum flange was fastened to the solid laminate by HI-LOK pins and adhesive. The average compressive failure loads of configurations 1, 2, and 3 were 295, 226, and 291 kN, respectively, and the average tensile failure loads were 47.3 (delamination), 83.7 (bolt failure), and 291 (fixture damage) kN, respectively. Considering the compressive failure loads only, both the configurations 1 and 3 showed good performance. However, the configuration 1 showed delamination in the corner of the composite flange under tension at early stage of loading. Therefore, it was confirmed that the structure that can effectively support tension and compressive loads at the same time is the configuration 3 which used a mechanically fastened aluminum flange so that there is no risk of delamination at the corner.

• Composites Research
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.9-16
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• 2011

This paper describes the crashworthiness evaluation and performance improvement of tilting train made of sandwich composites. The applied sandwich composite of carbody structure was composed of aluminum honeycomb core and glass/epoxy & carbon/epoxy laminate composite facesheet. Crashworthiness analysis of tilting train was carried out using explicit finite element analysis code LS-DYNA 3D. The 3D finite element model and 1D equivalent model were applied to save the finite element modeling and calculation time for crash analysis. The crash conditions of tilting train were conducted according to four crash scenarios of the Korean railway safety law. It found that the crashworthiness analysis results were satisfied with the performance requirements except the crash scenario-2. In order to meet the crashworthiness requirements for crash scenario-2, the stiffness reinforcement for the laminate composite cover and metal frames of cabmask structure was proposed. Consequentially, it has satisfied the requirement for crash scenario-2.

• Composites Research
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.9-14
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• 2006

Experimental investigation on heat transfer ratio was firstly performed with three types of sandwich panels such as the Carbon/Epoxy Skin-Aluminum Honeycomb and Balsa Core Sandwich Panel of 37mm thickness, the Carbon/Epoxy Aluminum Skin-Honeycomb Core Sandwich Panel of 57mm thickness (including insulator) and the Carbon/Epoxy Skin-Aluminum Honeycomb Core Sandwich Panel of 37mm thickness based on the KS F 2278:2003(Insulation test method of windows). In additional to this investigation, experimental tests were also done for evaluation of heat transportation ratio with the Aluminum Skin- Aluminium Honeycomb Sandwich Panels of 27mm and 35mm thickness, and Aluminum Skin-Foaming Aluminum Sandwich Panel of 27mm thickness by the KS F2277:2002 (Insulation measuring method of construction component-Calibration heat box method or protective heat box method). In this study, it was found that the larger net heat transfer cross sectional area between the skin and the sandwich core is given, the higher heat transportation ratio occurs. It was also found that the hybrid type insulation had better insulation characteristics compared to the non-hybrid type insulation.

• Composites Research
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.29-35
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• 2013

Composite sandwich structure can improve the specific bending stiffness significantly and save the weight nearly 30 percent compared with the composite laminates. However, it has more inherent uncertainties of the material property caused by manufacturing process than metals. Therefore, the reliability-based probabilistic design approach is required. In this paper, the PMS(Probabilistic Margin of Safety) is calculated for the simplified fuselage structure made of composite sandwich to provide the probabilistic reasonable evidence that the classical design method based on the safety factor cannot ensure the structural safety. In this phase, the probability density function estimated by CMCS(Crude Monte-Carlo Simulation) is used. Furthermore, the RBDO(Reliability-Based Design Optimization) under the probabilistic constraint are performed, and the RBDO-MPDF(RBDO by Moving Probability Density Function) is proposed for an efficient computation. The examined results in this paper can be helpful for advanced design techniques to ensure the reliability of structures under the uncertainty and computationally inexpensive RBDO methods.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.30 no.7
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• pp.44-50
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• 2002

Low-velocity impact on composite sandwich panel has been investigated. Contact force is computed from a proposed modified Hertzian contact law. The Hertzian contact law is constructed by adjusting numerical value of the exponent and reducing the through-the- thickness elastic constant of honeycomb core. The equivalent transverse elastic constant is calculated from the rule of mixture. Nonlinear equation to calculate the contact force is solved by the Newton-Raphson method and time integration is done by the Newmark-beta method. A finite element program for the low-velocity impact analysis is coded by implementing these techniques and an 18-node assumed strain solid element. Behaviors of composite sandwich panels subjected to low-velocity impact are analyzed for various cases with different geometry and lay-ups. It has been found that the present code with the proposed contact law can predict measured contact forces and contact times for most cases within reasonable error bounds.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Railway
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.518-525
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• 2009

This paper describes the evaluation of structural performance test and finite element analysis to verify the design of Bimodal Tram made of sandwich composites. The sandwich composite applied to vehicle structure was composed of a aluminum honeycomb core and WR580/NF4000 glass fabric/epoxy laminate composite facesheet. The load tests of vehicle structure were conducted for vertical load, compressive load, torsion and modal analysis according to JlS E 7105. The structural Integrity of vehicle was evaluated by the measurement of displacement, stress and natural frequency obtained from dial gauge, strain gauge and gravity sensor, respectively. And finite element analysis using ANSYS v11.0 was done to compare with structural test. The results showed that the displacement, stress and natural frequency were in an good agreement with those of structural analysis using the proposed finite element models.