Fabrication of Glass/Jute Hybrid Composite over Wrapped Aluminum Cylinders: An Advanced Material for Automotive Applications
Marwa A. Abd El‐baky, Mahmoud M. Awd Allah, Madeha Kamel, Walaa Abd‐Elaziem
Abstract
Abstract As a class of promising cost-effective lightweight structures, metal-composite hybrids have rapidly emerged in automotive industry largely attributable to their outstanding multifunctional and crashworthy characteristics. The aim of this study is to investigate the potentiality of metal-composite cylinders for crash energy absorption applications. In this context, the crashworthiness performance, and the deformation history of jute (J)/glass (G) reinforced epoxy hybrid composite over wrapped aluminum (Al) cylinders were experimentally studied under quasi-static axial loading. Crashworthiness characteristics of the proposed cylinders were evaluated by measuring the average and peak crushing loads ( $${\mathrm{F}}_{\mathrm{avg}}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>F</mml:mi> <mml:mi>avg</mml:mi> </mml:msub> </mml:math> , $${\mathrm{F}}_{\mathrm{ip}}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>F</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ip</mml:mi> </mml:msub> </mml:math> ), specific energy absorption ( $$\mathrm{SEA}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>SEA</mml:mi> </mml:math> ), total absorbed energy ( $$\mathrm{U})$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>U</mml:mi> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> , and crush force efficiency ( $$\mathrm{CFE}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>CFE</mml:mi> </mml:math> ). The influence of the number of J-layers on the deformation profiles has also been defined. Result revealed that the highest ( $${\mathrm{F}}_{\mathrm{ip}}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>F</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ip</mml:mi> </mml:msub> </mml:math> ), ( $${\mathrm{F}}_{\mathrm{avg}})$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>F</mml:mi> <mml:mi>avg</mml:mi> </mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> , and ( $$\mathrm{SEA}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>SEA</mml:mi> </mml:math> ) noted for Al-3G-2 J-3G with values of 85.45 kN, 53.14 kN, and 39.99 J/g, respectively. The maximum ( $$\mathrm{U}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>U</mml:mi> </mml:math> ) was documented for Al-8G with a value of 3535.89 J. The highest $$(\mathrm{CFE})$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>(</mml:mo> <mml:mi>CFE</mml:mi> <mml:mo>)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> was recorded for Al-2G-4 J-2G followed by Al-3G-2 J-3G with a value of 0.65 and 0.62, respectively. Al-3G-2 J-3G cylinders exhibit excellent energy-absorbing capacity and could be applied as energy-absorbing crashworthiness structures in automotive applications.