Finite Element Analysis(FEA) of a sandwich panel with hexagonal honeycomb core under tensile load

Abstract

Composite sandwich panels have been increasingly used in aerospace industry for various applications such as floor panels, comportment partitions, bulkheads, and even the skin and wings. It is important to design light weight structure for aircraft operations. The sandwich panel serves this requirement. The sandwich composites are multilayered materials made by bonding stiff, high strength skin facings to low density core material. In the present research work composites sandwich panel are developed, tested and analyzed using finite element analysis for various load cases. These load cases includes edge wise and flat wise loading i.e., loads applied in the plane of sandwich panel are considered edgewise loads and loads applied normal to the plane of the sandwich panel are considered flat wise loads. The number of layers in face sheet and thickness of core is optimized without affecting to the strength. This provides high strength to weight ratio which is necessary in aerospace applications. Also attempts are made to capture the environmental temperature gradients.