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A special issue of Applied Sciences (ISSN 2076-3417). This special issue belongs to the section "Transportation and Future Mobility".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 November 2022) | Viewed by 13735

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Jiefu Liu

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Guest Editor

School of Traffic & Transportation Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410012, China
Interests: sandwich structures; blast and impact engineering; honeycomb; crashworthiness
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Zhejian Li

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

Earthquake Engineering Research & Test Center, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou 510006, China
Interests: protective structures; energy absorption; origami structures; metamaterial
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Dr. Jie Zhang

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Guest Editor

School of Mechanical and Vehicle Engineering, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan 030024, Shanxi, China
Interests: protective structures; blast and impact engineering; reinforced concrete; meso-scale concrete model

Dr. Wensu Chen

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

Centre for Infrastructural Monitoring and Protection, School of Civil and Mechanical Engineering, Curtin University, Perth 6102, Australia
Interests: structural engineering; construction material/structure characteristics and dynamic mechanical behaviors; structural strengthening using FRP; development of novel protective structures/materials
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue is focused on the mechanical properties and structural design against dynamic loads for impact protective applications, as well as lightweight structural design and manufacturing for vehicle bodies. Specifically, the topics of interest include but are not limited to impact mitigation mechanism, energy absorption enhancement method, composite and lattice structures, vehicle impact system dynamics, fiber-reinforced materials, novel manufacturing and joint methods for lightweight vehicle bodies, and multiscale simulation methods for composite structures. The authors should demonstrate the innovation in their works, and particularly welcome works that are validated at the experimental level, with preliminary numerical simulations and analytical explanations. In situ applications are considered on the same level as laboratory measurements, although we do not anticipate case studies to make up the majority of the published papers.

Dr. Jiefu Liu
Dr. Zhejian Li
Dr. Jie Zhang
Dr. Wensu Chen
Guest Editors

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Published Papers (6 papers)

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Research

16 pages, 7390 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Static Compressive Properties of Polypropylene Fiber Foam Concrete with Concave Hexagonal Unit Cell

by Zhiqiang Yin, Zhenguo Shao, Chao Qi, Haoyuan Wu, Jianen Wang and Lulu Gao

Appl. Sci. 2023, 13(1), 132; https://doi.org/10.3390/app13010132 - 22 Dec 2022

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1666

Abstract

For the purpose of studying the influence of fiber on the negative Poisson’s ratio effect of foam concrete, a concave hexagonal unit cell structure of polypropylene fiber foam concrete was proposed. The effects of different fiber volume contents on the structural mechanical parameters, Poisson’s ratio, and energy absorption capacity of the unit cells were studied by static compression of concave hexagonal unit cells and cube specimens. The results show that the compressive strength of foam concrete is reduced by adding polypropylene fiber, and the peak stress of concave hexagonal unit cells decreases less rapidly than that of cube specimens. The proper amount of polypropylene fiber can enhance the deformation ability of the unit cells in foam concrete, and the Poisson’s ratio of the unit cells in foam concrete with 1.5% fiber content is the lowest. In the process of failure of concave hexagonal unit cells, the failure phenomenon is mainly concentrated on the concave surfaces on both sides, and the cracks are distributed in the form of “upper left and lower right” or “lower left and upper right”. When the content of polypropylene fiber is 0.5%, the total energy absorbed by the concave hexagonal cells in the compression deformation process increases by 12.98%. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vehicle Crashworthiness and Lightweight Design)

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18 pages, 6523 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Damage Mode Analysis of Steel Box Structures Subjected to Internal Blast Loading

by Lu-Meng Li, Duo Zhang and Shu-Jian Yao

Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(21), 10974; https://doi.org/10.3390/app122110974 - 29 Oct 2022

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1745

Abstract

Steel box structures widely exist in vehicles, ships, and buildings, and internal explosions are one of the primary ways to destroy such targets. In this study, a rapid prediction method for the damage degree evaluation of steel box structures subjected to internal blast loads was proposed. First, the main influencing factors were identified through dimensionless analysis. Next, numerical simulations were conducted to further investigate the key influencing factors and different damage modes that were classified according to their characteristics. The non-dimensional

D_{i n}^{*}

for damage analysis applicable to the internal explosions and the equations describing the deformation of the wall plate were proposed, followed by a comparative study of the damage features of anisotropic box structures with different structural dimensions. The influence of the coupling relationship between structural dimensions and blast loads on the damage modes was analyzed and three competing mechanisms of material failure were studied to analyze and classify the mode of breach expansion. Finally, a large number of experiments were analyzed to verify the analysis method. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vehicle Crashworthiness and Lightweight Design)

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24 pages, 7177 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Crashworthiness Analysis and Multi-Objective Optimization for Concave I-Shaped Honeycomb Structure

by Tingting Wang, Mengchun Li, Dongchen Qin, Jiangyi Chen and Hongxia Wu

Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(20), 10420; https://doi.org/10.3390/app122010420 - 15 Oct 2022

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2114

Abstract

Due to their superior structural and mechanical properties, materials with negative Poisson’s ratio are of increasing interest to research scholars, especially in fuel-efficient vehicles. In this work, a new concave I-shaped honeycomb structure is established by integrating the re-entrant hexagon and the I-shaped beam structure, and its negative Poisson’s ratio characteristics and energy absorption properties are investigated. The effect of structural parameters on the energy absorption characteristics is analyzed using the finite element model. The results show that both the specific energy absorption and peak impact force decrease with the increase in cellular length and vertical short cellular height, and increase with the increase in horizontal short cellular length and cellular thickness. To obtain a smaller peak impact force and larger specific energy absorption with smaller mass, the four cell sizes were optimized by using Latin hypercube sampling, Gaussian radial basis function, and non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGA-II). Compared with the original design, the SEA increased by 44.175%, and the PCF increased by 25.857%. Meanwhile, the mass decreased by 31.140%. Hence, the optimal structure has better crashworthiness. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vehicle Crashworthiness and Lightweight Design)

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10 pages, 2908 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Influence of Aging Time on Vertical Static Stiffness of Air Spring

by Zhaijun Lu, Penghao Si, Hao Xiao and Jiefu Liu

Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(9), 4219; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12094219 - 22 Apr 2022

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2153

Abstract

To study the aging mechanism of air springs, the effect of aging time on the vertical static stiffness of an air spring was systematically analyzed by means of an accelerated aging test and finite element simulation. Accelerated aging tests were carried out on the entire air spring, rubber material, and cord material, and the vertical static stiffness and elastic moduli of the rubber and cord materials of the entire air spring were obtained with aging time. The finite element simulation model of the air spring was established. Based on the experimental data, the influences of the elastic moduli of the rubber and cord materials, aged for different times, and the cord angle on the vertical static stiffness of an air spring were simulated and analyzed, and the law of the influence of aging on the vertical static stiffness characteristics of air springs was revealed. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vehicle Crashworthiness and Lightweight Design)

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16 pages, 3690 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Assessment of Nanobag as a New Safety System in the Frontal Sled Test

by Jan Špička, Tomasz Bońkowski, Luděk Hynčík and Alojz Hanuliak

Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(3), 989; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12030989 - 19 Jan 2022

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1652

Abstract

Objective: The future mobility challenges lead to considering new safety systems to protect vehicle passengers in non-standard and complex seating configurations. The objective of this study is to assess the performance of a brand new safety system called nanobag and to compare it to traditional airbag performance in the frontal sled test scenario. Methods: The nanobag technology is assessed in the frontal crash test scenario and compared with the standard airbag by numerical simulation. The previously identified material model is used to assemble the nanobag numerical model. The paper exploits an existing validated human body model to assess the performance of the nanobag safety system. Using both the new nanobag and the standard airbag, the sled test numerical simulations with the variation of human bodies were performed in 30 km/h and 50 km/h frontal impacts. Results: The sled test results for both the nanobag and the standard airbag based on injury criteria show a good and acceptable performance of the nanobag safety system compared to the traditional airbag. Conclusions: The results show that the nanobag system’s performance is comparable to the standard airbag’s, which means that, thanks to the design, the nanobag safety system has high potential and an extended application for multi-directional protection against impact. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vehicle Crashworthiness and Lightweight Design)

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15 pages, 3508 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Impact Testing of 3D Re-Entrant Honeycomb Polyamide Structure Using Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar

by Jiangping Chen, Weijun Tao and Shumeng Pang

Appl. Sci. 2021, 11(21), 9882; https://doi.org/10.3390/app11219882 - 22 Oct 2021

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2396

Abstract

In this study, a total of 30 3D re-entrant honeycomb specimens made of polyamide were fabricated with various configurations by using the additive manufacturing (AM) technique. Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar (SHPB) tests were conducted on the RH specimens at different impact velocities. The incident, reflected and transmitted waveforms can well explain the wave propagation and energy absorption characteristics of the specimens, which can help us to understand and analyse the process of impact loading. The stress–strain curves, energy absorption ability and failure modes of SHPB tests with different impact velocities and quasi-static compression tests were analysed and compared, and it was found that the flow stress and energy absorption ability of the specimens subjected to impact load were much improved. Among the tested specimens, specimen C2, with a smaller re-entrant angle θ, displayed the best energy absorption ability, which was 1.701 J/cm³ at the impact velocity of 22 m/s and was 5.1 times that in the quasi-static test. Specimen C5 had the longest horizontal length of the diagonal bar

L_{0}

, and its energy absorption was 1.222 J/cm³ at the impact velocity of 22 m/s and was 15.7 times that in the quasi-static test, reflecting the superiority of a structurally stable specimen in energy absorption under impact loading. The test results can provide a reference for the optimization of the design of the same or similar structures. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Vehicle Crashworthiness and Lightweight Design)

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