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Volume 15, Issue 3, 2006
EXPERIMENTAL CHARACTERISATION OF THIN SANDWICH PANEL OF POLYMER COMPOSITE
Prashant Kumar1,*, Axay Kumar2, Kamal.K. Kar3 & J. Ramkumar3
1 Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, IIT Kanpur 208 016, India
2 Scientist ‘SC’, ISRO Satellite Centre, Bangalore 560 017, India
3 Asst. Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, IIT Kanpur 208 016, India
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed, E-mail: jrkumar@iitk.ac.in
Received 6/06; accepted 8/06
ABSTRACT
A thin sandwich panel using 3 mm coremat and FRP skins of glassfibre chopped strand mat – epoxy was constructed through the hand lay-up technique. This kind of sandwich structure might replace a mild steel sheet enclosure used in many appliances and machines including auto bodies. The sandwich panels were characterized with three kinds of experimental investigation to find (i) flexural stiffness (ii) in-plane shear strength and (iii) impact-induced-damage by a low velocity foreign object. In comparison to mild steel, the sandwich panels were lighter with considerable saving in weight, the static strength was found to be attractively higher, flexural stiffness was better, and in-plane strength was reasonable. The impact-induced-damage and their mechanism of failure of these sandwich panels is also studied.
KEYWORDS:Sandwich structure, chopped strand mat, impact induced damage, polymer composite, flexural stiffness
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