Crashworthiness of hierarchical truncated conical shells with corrugated cores

Abstract

Novel corrugated hierarchical truncated conical shells (HTCS) with corrugated cores were designed for energy absorption under quasi-static axial compression. The crashworthiness of the HTCS were studied by experimental and numerical methods. The influence of the number of corrugations and the number of layers of corrugated core on total energy absorption was quantified. Finally, based on the surrogate model and genetic algorithm of NSGA-II, the structure was optimized with multiple objectives. Increasing either the HS or N or both can form more stable and more plastic hinges and cause obvious coupling effects, beneficial for the HTCS to achieve enhanced resistance to overall buckling and enhanced energy absorption.