Analytical and experimental study on the fluid structure interaction during air blast loading

A new fluid-structure interaction model that considers high gas compressibility is developed using the Rankine-Hugoniot relations. The impulse conservation between the gas and structure is utilized to determine the reflected pressure profile from the known incident pressure profile. The physical parameters of the gas such as the shock front velocity, gas density, local sound velocity, and gas particle velocity as well as the impulse transmitted onto the structure are also evaluated. A series of one-dimensional shock loading experiments on free standing monolithic aluminum plates were conducted using a shock tube to validate the proposed model. The momentum was evaluated using high speed digital imagery. The experimental peak reflected pressure, the reflected pressure profile, and the momentum transmitted onto the plate were compared with the predicted results. The comparisons show that the gas's compressibility significantly affects the fluid structure interaction behavior, and the new model can predict more accurate results than existing models. The effect of factors, such as the areal density of a plate and the peak incident pressure on momentum transfer are also discussed using the present model. Moreover, the maximum achievable momentum and the fluid structure interaction time are defined and calculated. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3662948]