Composite sandwich and laminate materials against blast loads

Large-scale blast testing has proved that full-field displacement and in-plane strain data can be reliably obtained for composite sandwich panels secured around their edge during explosive events. Detailed deformation maps were obtained using digital image correlation (DIC) under extreme shock loading conditions and have been validated by point measurements using a laser gauge system. The DIC technique is now being adopted by other research groups for similar blast experiments. Important in this researchwas the support arrangement for the composite sandwich panels and how it influenced, as a design consideration, the mode and location of failure. Several studies were conducted which showed a number of real scenarios for naval structures, such as multiple blast impacts as well as a number of different blast impacts on a number of different constructions. Each of these studies has shown that the modes of failure are front-face dominated compared to the underwater blasts, which involved both front-and back-face failures being observed.