Aluminium foldcores for sandwich structure application: Mechanical properties and FE-simulation

•Novel sandwich core.•Core properties can be adjusted.•Static and dynamic testing and simulations.•Imperfections included in modeling.

Foldcore is an origami-like structural sandwich core which is manufactured by folding a planar base material into a three dimensional structure. The manufacturing technology is open to a variety of base materials and also a range of unit cell geometries is feasible. This results in a wide spectrum of homogenized mechanical properties which can be achieved by foldcores.Aluminium was found to be a suitable base material for building high performance foldcores with high stiffness, strength and energy absorption capabilities. In this study aluminium foldcores are built and tested in compression, shear, bending and impact. Simulation methods are developed and validated along these test series. Simulation shows good agreement to experiments and is therefore a good method for further foldcore developments.