Localized effects across core junctions in sandwich beams subjected to in-plane and out-of-plane loading

The paper concerns local effects that occur across junctions between different cores in sandwich beams subjected to in-plane and out-of-plane loads. These local effects display themselves by a significant rise of the bending normal stresses in the faces of the sandwich near the core junctions. At the same time, an elevation of the transverse normal and shear stresses in the adjacent core parts is observed. The nature and intensity of the local effects is studied for sandwich beams loaded statically by axial (in-plane) and transverse (out-of-plane) forces. Two types of core junctions, namely a conventional butt junction and a reinforced butt junction, are investigated experimentally. The experimental data coincides perfectly with the numerical simulations performed using Finite Element Analysis.