A parametric study of the bending crash performance of empty and metal foam-filled box-beams

The effect of spot welding failure, flange location, sheet metal thickness, glue presence in foam-wall contact area, and foam filling on the bending crash performance and the collapse mechanism of empty and foam-filled box-beams is investigated. It is observed that the flange location in box-beams controls spot welds force, the energy absorption capacity of box-beams, and collapse behavior of the sections. As a result, the definition of spot weld failure criterion is inevitable in most cases. A survey on the effect of slight aluminium foam filling (12% mass increase) shows that the specific energy absorption value (SEA) and the energy dissipation performance of a filled section can even compete with a thicker beam. Also, the collapse pattern of sections and the number of wrinkles for many box-beams are obviously changed in the presence of foam and glue.