Bending behaviors of metallic sandwich plates with a sheared dimple core under simply supported loading

Abstract

In this study, the bending responses of metallic sandwich plates with a sheared dimple core were investigated through the 3-point bending tests and dynamic plane bending tests. It was experimentally shown from the uniaxial tensile tests that the yield and tensile strengths of the brazed face sheet were weaker than those of the welded face sheet. A mild steel sheared dimple core was fabricated by the sectional forming process and then bonded with DP590 face sheets by multi-point resistance welding. Analysis for large deformation of a sandwich plate subject to 3-point bending was carried out, where frictional work was considered and a face sheet was treated as a rigid-plastic material based on Hollomon's flow rule. Load-deflection curves and the deformed shapes of the finite element method computations and the experiments were efficiently predicted by the proposed analysis. The effect of frictional work on the peak load and energy absorption increases as the bending angle increases. The dynamic bending responses of the sandwich plates, such as the effect of a deformed shape, failure mode, energy absorption and absorption ratio were compared with those of a high-strength steel sheet. It was demonstrated that a bendable sandwich plate was stronger construction than a high-strength steel sheet under the tested conditions, despite the weight reduction and weaker properties.