Experimental and Numerical Investigation of Impact Characteristics of the E-Glass/Toughened Vinylester Composite Car Hood Panels

Abstract

This study involves experimental and numerical investigation on the impact response of a section of typical car hood having reinforcement in its inner layer containing a common X-shaped hat section. The hood specimens were developed by utilizing E-glass/Vinylester prepreg. The effect of stiffening the inner layer’s reinforcement region by placing a balsawood layer in the X-shaped hat section was also studied. Impact test was performed by driving the impacting pendulum by using the pneumatic device at a velocity of 4.1 m/s to evaluate the impact response of the composite hood panels having balsawood layer and of those without it. Impact test results; load-time, displacement–time, load–deflection history from experimental is presented at 200 kJ impact energy. Explicit finite element analysis was performed by utilizing commercially available LS-Dyna code. The computational model was developed to predict the response of both types of composite car hood panels under dynamic loading. A comparison of the experimental results i.e., deflection-time, load-time histories and kinetic energy with FEA results for both types of composite car hood panels was made. Results correlate well and form the basis for analyzing and designing such new lightweight material systems for automotive applications.