Behaviour of a novel stiffener-enhanced steel–concrete–steel sandwich beam subjected to impact loading

Abstract

Abstract A new stiffener-enhanced steel–concrete–steel (SESCS) sandwich beam was proposed for impact resisting, and the dynamic response of the SESCS sandwich beam under low-velocity impact loading was experimentally, numerically and analytically studied. Drop weight impact loading tests on SESCS sandwich beams were first conducted to obtain their failure modes, impact forces and displacement responses. All the tested beams exhibited flexural failure modes, and the impact resistance was found to be significantly improved for the beam enhanced with stiffeners in the tension plate. The Finite Element (FE) model of the SESCS sandwich beam under impact loading was established and validated against the test data in terms of failure mode, impact force and displacement. In addition, an analytical model was also developed for predicting displacement response of the SESCS sandwich beam under impact loading. The analytical-predicted displacement responses were found to be well matched with the FE-predictions and test results, which demonstrated the accuracy of the proposed analytical model.