Fracture of Metal Foams: In‐situ Testing and Numerical Modeling

Abstract This paper is on a combined experimental/modeling study on the tensile fracture of open‐cell foams. In‐situ tensile tests show that individual struts can fail in a brittle or ductile mode, presumably depending on the presence of casting defects. In‐situ single strut tests were performed, enabling observation of deformation and fracture behavior and, in addition, serving as calibration for the proposed single‐strut model. The single strut model consists of beam elements to account for elasticity and plasticity, and of special‐purpose fracture elements to account for failure. The model is demonstrated for a characteristic loading configuration, combining stretching and bending.