Sandwich Module

Perform analyses on a composite sandwich plate.

Sandwich Plate

In Helius Composite, a sandwich plate is considered to be a rectangular plate composed of two identical thin laminates that are bonded to, but separated by, a thick core. The image below shows the geometry of the sandwich plate and its position and orientation relative to the global coordinate system. The length (L) of the sandwich plate is along the global X axis. The width (W) of the sandwich plate is along the global Y axis. The total thickness of the sandwich plate is T = 2T_f + T_C where T_f is the thickness of each of the face sheet laminates and T_C is the thickness of the core material. Helius Composite utilizes Classical Laminate Theory for the analysis of the sandwich plate, thus analysis is restricted to thin sandwich plates where T<<W and T<<L. Under these conditions, Classical Laminate Theory is appropriate for modeling the bending, buckling, and vibration response of the sandwich plate.

In the analysis of sandwich plates, it is assumed the same laminate is used for both the top and bottom set of face sheets. Helius Composite does not analyze sandwich plates that have different laminated face sheets on the top and bottom of the core.

Sandwich Plate Analysis

The Sandwich Analysis window, accessed from the Sandwich drop-down menu, provides access to three different laminated sandwich composite analysis features: Beam Bending, Panel Bending, and Stability. Below is a brief description of each of the three laminated sandwich composite analysis features accessible from the Sandwich Analysis window. A detailed description of these three analysis features and their use is given on the pages that follow.

1. Beam Bending - Compute the transverse deflection of a sandwich beam due to a wide variety of transverse load types and boundary conditions.
2. Panel Bending - Compute the transverse deflection of a simply supported sandwich plate to a uniform distributed transverse load.
3. Stability - Compute the critical buckling load of a laminated sandwich plate subjected to uniaxial in-plane compression for a variety of clamped and simply supported boundary conditions.

The Sandwich Analysis window has five tabs. The first two are the Laminate tab and the Sandwich Geometry tab. Once the laminate and the sandwich geometry are defined, select from one of the three analysis tabs to conduct beam bending, panel bending, or stability analysis. Upon selecting one of these tabs, feature-specific options will enable you to define aspects of the selected analysis. A detailed description of these tabs is included in the sections listed below.