Energy Absorption of Origami Crash Box: Numerical Simulation and Theoretical Analysis

Author(s):  
Mengyan Shi ◽  
Jiayao Ma ◽  
Yan Chen ◽  
Zhong You

Thin-walled tubes as energy absorption devices are widely in use for their low cost and high manufacturability. Employing origami technique on a tube enables induction of a predetermined failure mode so as to improve its energy absorption efficiency. Here we study the energy absorption of a hexagonal tubular device named the origami crash box numerically and theoretically. Numerical simulations of the quasi-static axial crushing show that the pattern triggers a diamond-shaped mode, leading to a substantial increase in energy absorption and reduction in initial peak force. The effects of geometric parameters on the performance of the origami crash box are also investigated through a parametric study. Furthermore, a theoretical study on the deformation mode and energy absorption of the origami crash box is carried out, and a good match with numerical results is obtained. The origami crash box shows great promise in the design of energy absorption devices.

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiayao Ma ◽  
Huaping Dai ◽  
Mengyan Shi ◽  
Lin Yuan ◽  
Yan Chen ◽  
...  

Abstract. Thin-walled tubes are widely used as energy absorption devices for their low cost and high manufacturability. Introduction of the origami technique enables the tube to follow a pre-determined failure mode and to improve its energy absorption efficiency. This paper examines the energy absorption characteristics of the origami crash box under quasi-static axial crushing. Both experimental and numerical results show that the origami pattern develops a diamond-shaped mode, bringing a reduction in initial peak force and a significant increase in energy absorption compared to the conventional hexagonal tube. The sensitivity of its energy absorption performance to various parameters is studied, and it is shown to achieve 68.29 % increase in the specific energy absorption and 13.91 % reduction in the initial peak force in the optimal case. Furthermore, an analytical solution is presented for the energy absorption, which achieves reasonable agreement with the numerical results.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Junxian Zhou ◽  
Chuang Dong ◽  
Bingzhi Chen ◽  
Xu Niu

An improved pyramidal prefolded pattern was designed and applied to thin-walled tubes. This delicately designed pattern modularizes the tube to control the folding process and act as an inducer to trigger deformation modes with outstanding crushing performance. Dynamic crushing tests were conducted numerically; the simulation results reveal that the patterned square tube developed a deformation mode with shorter wavelength, better load consistencies, and higher energy-absorption efficiency (up to 29%) than that of the traditional counterpart. Moreover, geometric analysis was performed and structural improvements were conducted by applying the optimal geometric parameters onto an octagonal profile. The designed patterned octagonal tube collapsed into a highly efficient deformation mode known as diamond mode. Furthermore, the comparative results show that patterned octagonal tubes demonstrated an energy absorption up to 90.1% higher than that of a conventional square column while improving the geometric compliance. These findings enrich research on patterned tubes and provide new explorations for the development of high-performance energy-absorbing structures.


2020 ◽  
Vol 87 (8) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yizhe Liu ◽  
Feng Xiong ◽  
Kuijian Yang ◽  
Yuli Chen

Abstract Impact accidents cause great damage to lives and properties because the destructiveness, direction, and action mode of impact loadings can hardly be predicted. Ordinary thin-walled tube systems for energy absorption require outside constraints or inside fasteners to avoid tube splashing, which affects the modifiability of the systems and limits their application in emergencies. In an effort to break through this limitation, inspired by windmill, a novel omnidirectional self-locked energy absorption system has been proposed. The proposed system is made up of thin-walled tubes with windmill-liked cross section, which are specially designed to interlock with adjacent tubes and thus provide constraints among individual tubes to resist impact loadings in spatial arbitrary directions. The spatial omnidirectional self-locking capability of the windmill-inspired system is demonstrated under distributed and concentrated impact loadings. Moreover, the windmill-inspired system shows higher energy absorption efficiency than that of the widely used round tube system and previous self-locked system under loadings in various directions, and their energy absorption properties can be further improved by combining with the round tube system, adjusting the geometric parameter of each tube and designing the arrangement of tubes with different properties in the system. This work may shed light on the energy absorption system design and expand the application of self-locked energy absorption systems.


Author(s):  
Zhichao Li ◽  
Subhash Rakheja ◽  
Wen-Bin Shangguan

Thin-walled structures are widely used as energy absorbers in automotive vehicles due to their lightweight and high-energy absorption efficiency. In order to improve the energy absorption characteristics of thin-walled structures subjected to different loading angles, different types of novel multi-cell structures are proposed in this paper. The numerical method is used to study the crushing behaviors of the proposed multi-cell structures under different loading angles. It is found that the proposed multi-cell structures have considerably small initial peak force under axial load and avoid the appearance of global buckling deformation mode under oblique loads. Moreover, reasonably distributed wall thickness for each square tube in the thin-walled structure can enhance its energy absorption capacity under different loading angles.


Author(s):  
Degao Hou ◽  
Yan Chen ◽  
Jiayao Ma ◽  
Zhong You

Thin-walled tubes are widely used as energy absorption devices in automobiles, designed to protect the costly structures and people inside during an impact event through plastic deformation. They show excellent performance under axial loading in terms of weight efficiency, stroke distance and total energy absorption, but also have the disadvantage that the crushing force is not uniform during deformation process, especially with the existence of a high initial peak force. Recently, pattern design on tubular structures has received increasing attention. It has been found that, if the surface of a tube is pre-folded according to an origami pattern, the collapse mode of the tube can be altered, leading to changes in energy absorption performance. In this paper, we present a series of origami patterned tubes with a kite-shape pattern that is constructed by joining two pieces of Miura-ori. First of all, the geometry of the pattern is presented. We develop a theoretical model to predict the energy absorption associated with the axial crushing of the patterned tubes and derive a mathematical formula to calculate the mean crushing force accordingly. Secondly, a family of origami tubes with various profiles are designed, and their performances subjected to quasi-static axial crushing are numerically investigated. A parametric study is also conducted to establish the relationship between the pre-folded angle of the pattern and the initial peak force as well as the mean crushing force. Numerical results show that introducing patterns to thin-walled tubes offers three advantages in comparison with conventional tubes, i.e., a lower initial peak force, a more uniform crushing load, and a stable and repeatable collapse mode. A 36.0% increase in specific energy absorption and 67.2% reduction in initial peak force is achieved in the optimum case. The new origami patterned tubes show great promise as energy absorption devices.


2014 ◽  
Vol 624 ◽  
pp. 13-19
Author(s):  
Zhao Peng Zhou ◽  
You Quan Qin ◽  
Fei Liu ◽  
Yan Mi Wang

In order to enhance the lateral compression energy absorption capability of round steel tube without obviously increasing the mass of round steel tube, this paper has developed the polyurethane foam filled round steel tube and through experimental comparison, studied such parameters as the laterally-compressed platform loading, total absorbed energy and energy absorbed per unit mass for the filled tubes and empty tubes of three kinds of pipe diameter. The results show that the round steel tube filled with polyurethane foam can change the deformation mode of round steel tube and increase the energy absorption capability of steel tube substantially with very little increase of mass; the energy absorption efficiency is obviously higher than the one of empty steel tube.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (21) ◽  
pp. 10178
Author(s):  
Tetsuya Gomi ◽  
Shotaro Ayuzawa ◽  
Yuta Urushiyama ◽  
Kazuhito Misaji ◽  
Susumu Takahashi ◽  
...  

The development of a carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic (CFRP) part is carried out by utilizing many experimental results in deciding the design. For this reason, the development period of a CFRP structure is long and an obstacle for commercialization. In this paper, multiple regression analysis is used to derive a response surface that estimates the generated load using the shape parameters of a corrugated collision energy absorbing structure to shorten the development period. To obtain the response surface, we conducted a quasistatic crushing experiment by using the length of linear portions (pitch) and the number of stacks (thickness) of a corrugated shape as parameters. When progressive crushing mode is observed, energy absorption efficiency decreases with the increase in pitch, and increases with the increase in the number of stacks. To discuss how energy absorption efficiency changes, a comparison examination is conducted using the derived response surfaces. Results indicate that specifications with high energy absorption efficiency can be accurately selected using the response surface of primary expression. In addition, differences in deformation mode were due to the influence of the stress at the corner portion of a part.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document