Blast Protection for Polymer Composite Materials in Structures Subjected to Air-Blast Loading

Composite materials are becoming more popular in structural applications as a result of their lightweight, thermal resistance, good corrosion resistance, and adaptability of properties depending upon the orientation of the fiber layers within the structure. Fiber-reinforced polymer composites, foam core sandwich panels, and fiber metal laminates (FMLs) are examples of composite materials that are employed in high-performance aerospace, marine, motor racing, and sporting applications. Explosion loading is a loading case that must be considered in a growing number of situations, and therefore the blast behavior of composite materials is a subject of increasing importance, particularly for vulnerable transportation systems. This chapter provides a brief introduction to explosion characteristics and blast loading scenarios. Various blast protection design paradigms are reported and discussed for different structural applications. Recent research, in the areas of fiber-reinforced composite laminates, polymeric sandwich panels, multilayered FML structures, and curved panels are discussed. The latter part of the chapter summarizes the state of the art in the computational modeling of air-blast loaded of composites. When compared to advances in modeling foams and metals, there are still several challenges posed, particularly regarding modeling perforation failure and 3D damage evolution.