An improved technique for verification of high-speed impact simulation

The risk of strange objects impacts that can decrease local strength properties must be taken into account in the design of primary airframe structures in the aeronautics, energy and space industries. Damage that may occur as a result of high-speed impacts can affect the structure load carrying capacity of the structure. Testing all impact scenarios on real structures is expensive and impractical. This paper integrates numerical analyses with high-speed impact tests of hail stones on flat metallic and composite panels. A new technique for displacement measurements using a laser triangulation sensor during impacts were proposed and used for a quantitative analysis and for precision verification of a numerical model results. A comparison between the testing and simulation results reveals consistent predictions of damage initialization on the composite material and plastic deformation on the metallic material. The application of flat test panels for verification and tuning of the numerical models allows an optimized final design of a real structure and decreases the risk of non-compliance of the structure during verification tests. (C) 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.