On the modeling of crush behavior of a closed-cell aluminum foam structure

Crush behavior of a closed-cell aluminum foam is studied analytically and numerically. A new model of a truncated cube, which captures the basic folding mechanism of an array of cells, is developed. The model consists of a system of collapsing cruciform and pyramidal sections. Theoretical analysis is based on energy consideration in conjunction with the minimum principle in plasticity. The assumed kinematic model for the crushing mechanism of the truncated cube cell gives a good agreement with the deformation mechanism obtained from the numerical simulation. Analytical formulation for the crushing resistance of the truncated cube cell is shown to correlate very accurately with the numerical results. Closed form solutions for crushing resistance of closed-cell aluminum foam in terms of relative density are developed. The formulas are compared with the experimental results and give an excellent agreement. (C) 1998 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.