Modeling failure modes of isotropic three-dimensional reticulated porous metal foams under several typical loads

Three dimensional reticulated porous metal foams are widely used engineering materials. A failure model with the simplified structure of these porous materials has been established, and the failure modes have been analyzed for the corresponding porous components under several typical loads, which include torsion, shearing and bending. The failure modes cover the tensile fracture, the shearing and the buckling of the strut, which may lead to the final destruction of the whole porous structure. The mathematical relationships, which characterize different failure modes, have been derived for the strut failure resulting from loading for these porous components under the above loading conditions. The results also show that the failure mode is related with the material species for these materials under the above loads. The tensile fracture of the strut will occur for the porous body with metallic materials in most cases, and the shearing fracture of the strut may occur for that in a relatively little cases. Moreover, the elastic buckling, the elastic–plastic buckling and the edge yielding may also occur on the strut of porous bodies when certain conditions are met.

► This work reveals the failure mode of the porous component under torsional, shearing or bending loads.
► This work presents the mathematical relations of different failure modes for porous materials under the above loads.
► This work suggests the possibilities of failure modes for the pore-strut of porous components.