DEVELOPMENT OF NOVEL CELLULAR AND FUNCTIONALLY LAYERED STRUCTURAL SYSTEMS FOR PENETRATION RESISTANCE - AN EXPERIMENTAL AND NUMERICAL APPROACH

Abstract

A bio-inspired cellular structural system is developed to contain the radial fracture damage of a hexagonal mortar cell subjected to projectile impact through boundary impedance mismatch, while utilizing its adjacent cells as a mutual confining mechanism to control penetration resistance. On a complementary track, a functionally layered approach, using rubberized mortar and geotextile, was pursued to develop a two and three layered cement composite system of varying thickness to control penetration resistance and reduce crater damage. This was followed by a combined design of the two systems to verify the beneficial effects of both approaches. The penetration resistance and radial damage were evaluated both experimentally and numerically. It was found that the cellular design was effective in significantly reducing the radial damage for an incoming projectile with modest increase in penetration depth. When combined with functional layering, crater damage was further reduced with insignificant effects on the penetration depth.