Design of mechanical properties of open-cell porous materials based on μCT study of commercial foams

Abstract

In the present paper numerical design of mechanical properties of open-cell porous materials is addressed. A detailed knowledge of mechanisms and parameters determining mechanical properties (i.e. Young's Modulus, Poisson's Ratio) of foams is essential for applications such as energy absorbers or lightweight construction materials. The foam structures were designed using procedure based on Laguerre-Voronoi tessellations (LVT) with microcomputed tomography of commercial foams used as reference. Foam morphology was studied on post-processed computed tomography images and the parameters of LVT structures were compared with commercial materials. Subsequently finite element method (FEM) calculations were performed on both types of structures to validate the LVT design algorithm. The results show that the described design procedure can be successfully used for modeling mechanical properties of open-cell foam structures.