Blast-resilience of honeycomb sandwich panels

Well-designed honeycomb sandwich panels are known to have superior blast performance compared to their corresponding solid panel of the same mass. However, the residual structural capacity of honeycomb sandwich panels and their blast resilience has not been systematically studied. Here, we investigate the structural behavior of all-metal honeycomb sandwich panels after shock loading using detailed numerical simulations. The initial shock is varied from relatively small intensities to moderate intensities sufficient to create material failure and significant plastic deformation in the panel. The structural response of the shock-loaded panels is investigated under quasi-static punch indentation and in-plane compression. The maximum load carrying and energy absorption capacities of shock-loaded panels are quantified for a wide range of initial shock intensities and different panel core densities. Failure maps for the honeycomb panels were constructed for each quasi-static loading condition by considering three failure modes: core failure, face sheet failure, and total panel detachment from its support. This study provides new insights into the behavior and structural resilience of the shock-loaded sandwich panels, while further highlighting their potential in the development of resilient structural systems.