Static uniaxial compressive experiments were conducted to study the mechanical behaviors of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) hydrogels in ambient conditions. It was found that water is expelled during the compression of hydrogels that have high water contents. It means hydrogels may be a mass variable under the compression. In order to depict the mechanical properties intrinsically, a variable mass model with meso-scale cells was proposed to simulate PVA hydrogels. In the model, there are uniform cells with frames of polymer fibers and water, and a virtue membrane designed to wrap up the boundary of the model. The model not only depicts the behaviors of the compressive mechanics and the expelled water, but also explains the nonlinear stress–strain relation of PVA hydrogels and why the hydrogels with high water content demonstrate a modulus considerably lower than the bulk modulus of water.

A new design of aluminum foam composite panels with enhanced ribs was proposed, and the energy absorption property of it was analyzed by combining dynamic testing and numerical simulation. The optimization of aluminum foam composite panels with enhanced ribs was investigated assuming that the panels had the same total mass. An Instron drop hammer test machine was used to study the dynamic compressive behavior of the new composite panels and the impact deformation characteristics of the components. Finite element method (FEM) software was employed to simulate the loading process, and the simulation results were compared with the experimental data for validating the reliability of the model. The effect of rib-mass ratio on the energy absorption property was investigated, and the energy absorption capacities of the new composite panels and conventional sandwiches were compared at different impact velocities. The analysis shows that, compared with conventional sandwich panels, aluminum foam composite panels with enhanced ribs have better energy absorption subjected to uniform distributed loading; and both rib-mass ratio and impact velocity have an effect on the normalized energy absorption. The results of this study can be a reference for related academic research and engineering application.

As an ultra-soft material (elastic modulus in magnitude of kPa), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) hydrogels have the potential to substitute articular cartilage, but the measurement of the dynamic stress–strain relations of ultra-soft materials is still challenging. In this paper, a double-striker electromagnetic driving split-Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) system was developed, in which all the bars were made of polycarbonate, and the polycarbonate striker was pushed by a metal striker driven electromagnetically to ensure the precise control of impact velocity. With the new SHPB system, well design of the size of hydrogel specimen and rational processing of the signal data, the stress–strain relations of hydrogels with varied PVA contents at different strain rates were measured successfully. Experimental results indicate that PVA hydrogels are a positive strain rate sensitive material with different strain-rate effects at low and high strain rates. Finally, based on the latest quasi-static constitution of the PVA hydrogel, a rate-dependent constitutive equation was recommended, which may well depict the mechanical behaviors of hydrogels with different fiber contents at varied strain rates. It also derives that the contributions of strain rate and fiber content on the mechanical behaviors of the hydrogel are relatively independent.

This paper presents the low-velocity impact tests on the sandwich plates with aluminum foam core and aluminum skins at elevated temperatures. A furnace, attached to an Instron Dynatup 9250 HV drop hammer system, was designed to accomplish the penetration tests at temperatures up to 500°C. In order to process the experimental data accurately, the numerical vibration analysis was conducted to determine the threshold frequencies of the fast Fourier transform (FFT) filter for the original impact data. The experimental results showed that the failure modes of the sandwich, peak load and absorbed energy varied obviously with temperatures. Furthermore, the results showed that the failure modes of the top skin and metal foam core showed minor changes with respect to temperatures. Whereas the failure mode of the bottom skin and peak loads changed significantly with respect to temperatures. Also, the absorbed energy revealed a three-stage variation with the change of temperature.

Split Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) technique is the most important test method to characterize dynamic stress–strain relations of various materials at different strain rates, and this technique requires uniform deformation of specimen during the experiment. However, some studies in recent years have found obvious deformation localization within metal foam specimens in SHPB tests, which may significantly affect the reliability of the results. Usability of SHPB to characterize dynamic stress–strain relation of metal foam becomes doubtful. In this paper, based on experimental verification, we carried out numerical simulative SHPB tests to study the problem, in which the metal foam specimens were modeled to have 3D meso structures with properties of their matrix material. Numerical simulative SHPB tests of aluminum foam specimens with varying thickness at different strain rates were performed. Deformation distribution in each local region of the specimen was examined and a concept of “effective specimen” was presented. Appropriate specimen thickness and range of testing strain rate were suggested based on quantitative analysis. Finally, we recommended a method how to revise the nominal strain and strain rate measured by traditional SHPB method to acquire the reliable dynamic stress–strain relation.