Experimental and numerical investigation of a three point bending test on sandwich panel with CFRP skins and aluminum honeycomb core

In this paper, an experimental–numerical investigation of three point bending test (TPBT) on sandwich panel with carbon fiber reinforce plastic (CFRP) skins and aluminum honeycomb core is presented. This sandwich panel has been fabricated at first. To ensure that the uniformity and homogeneity of fabricated sandwich panel is acceptable, the repetitive similar tests has been done. Then a dedicated focus on numerical model is presented. Using data obtained from tensile tests for CFRP skins and core specifications from its data sheet, a detailed finite element model in ABAQUS 6.12, has been built. After achieving to optimized FE model, numerical results and experimental data have been compared. From this comparison between experimental test and numerical model, it has been found that this FE model is able to predict the effect of various parameters on mechanical behavior of sandwich panel. In this study, the effect of different skin thicknesses and mechanical properties are studied in FE modeling.