Investigation of static and fatigue behavior of honeycomb sandwich structure: a computational approach

Honeycomb Sandwich Composites are extensively used in high structural applications owing to their low weight and high stiffness properties. Various material combinations were investigated computationally to attain improved static and fatigue response. Aluminium 7075-T6 as honeycomb core and Ti-6Al-4V as face sheet was found to be the best combination. The fatigue response of the specimen was carried out as per ASTM C393 standard. Using the same, the static bending tests were also carried out. The proposed honeycomb structure was modeled and Finite Element Analysis was performed in ANSYS. There was a good agreement between theoretical and simulated results carried out for static deflection. The fatigue life of the specimen was validated with the results available in the literature. The reduction in fatigue life associated with load value was found out to be approximately linear. Further, experimental analysis was carried out to validate computational work. The obtained results presented exceptional fatigue behavior of the proposed honeycomb composite. The proposed material combination is expected to have great feasibility in aerospace applications based on the findings.