Experimental and numerical analysis of laterally impacted stiffened plates considering the effect of strain rate

A proper numerical simulation method is developed to simulate structure impact problems that consider the effect of strain rate. High-speed tensile tests were carried out to obtain the stress-strain relationships at different strain rates, and these results were used as material inputs to analyze the dynamic response of laterally impacted stiffened plates. The simulation results are compared with falling weight impact experiments, and good agreement was obtained. The stress-strain relationships obtained from highspeed tensile tests and the Cowper-Symonds constitutive (CS) model were compared. Part of the results shows that the curve obtained from the CS model is higher than that obtained from the high-speed tensile test and that with increasing strain rate, the distance will become more pronounced. The numerical simulation is verified and fits the experimental result well. The failure strain is affected by the mesh size in finite element simulation and will decrease with decreasing mesh size. Different mesh sizes for the model can be simulated accurately, once an appropriate material input is obtained. These conclusions can be very useful for studying large-scale impact problems, such as ship collisions and groundings, and can guide engineering applications. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.