A multifunctional honeycomb metastructure for vibration suppression

In this study, a multifunctional metastructure is proposed for vibration suppression by combining a honeycomb sandwich structure and a locally resonant metastructure. To localize the low-frequency bandgaps, an analytical model based on Hamilton's principle and the energy averaging technique is developed and is confirmed by a three-dimensional numerical simulation. Moreover, the effective mass density is determined analytically to give a physical insight into the wave control mechanism. Then, the dynamic behavior of the finite structure is investigated analytically. A finite element (FE) simulation and experimental measurements are performed to demonstrate the validity and accuracy of this dynamic model. Results show that the proposed metastructure exhibits an excellent vibration suppression performance, as well as a significant tunability. Furthermore, to claim multifunctionality, the out-of-plane compression behavior is analyzed experimentally. Experimental results indicate that mechanical properties of the proposed metastructure are significantly improved in comparison with a traditional square honeycomb sandwich structure. The proposed strategy is a novel multi-functional combination, which can help realize vibration control and high mechanical efficiency. This will significantly impact multiple research areas in vibration analysis and provide engineering applications.