Mechanical properties of aluminum foams: Experimental and computational study

Zoran Ren and Matej Vesenjak

University of Maribor, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Slovenia

Lightweight metallic materials, such as aluminum foams, have an attractive combination of mechanical and thermal properties, e.g. low density and high specific stiffness in relation to their weight and are thus very suitable for applications in many modern engineering products. Their behavior under mechanical loading mainly depends on relative density and base material, with other influential factors being morphology (open or closed cell), the geometry and topology (regular or irregular structure) of the cellular structure. Aluminum foams are particularly suitable for use in impact energy absorbers, which are subjected to high strain rate deformations. Since there are only few research results available in this regards, it is particularly important to further study their behaviour and properly characterise all important influential parameters. This can be best achieved through combination of dedicated experimental testing programme and subsequent computational simulations.

The presentation will first review some basic properties of aluminum foams and discuss their advantages and shortcomings. Then, their application possibilities will be briefly discussed. Next part of presentation will be dedicated to discuss the results of conducted experimental testing of aluminum foam samples with particular attention to their behaviour under impact loading. The presentation will then focus on our methodology for proper 3D geometrical modelling of irregular aluminum foam structure and consequent formation of lattice finite element model, used in computational simulations. At the end some results of parametric computational simulations of aluminum foam behaviour under different loading conditions will be presented. The presentation will close with some derived conclusions of conducted study and a proposal for cooperation in further experimental and computational studies of cellular materials.