Mechanics of Sandwich Structures

This text represents the proceedings of the EUROMECH 360 Colloquium held in Saint-Etienne, France, 13-15 May, 1997. The main purpose of this meeting was to explore the progress made in sandwich analysis and design, including mechanical modelling and testing. The main advantages of sandwiches as structural components are now well-known and well-established. Due to progress in polymer science and engineering and advances in manufacturing processes, sandwich structures can blend various functional and structural properties and therefore lead to highly innovative systems. The current difficulty to overcome is to provide designers with proper methodologies and tools that enable them to design improved sandwich structures. The main themes covered by the colloquium are: modelling of sandwich structure behaviour; dynamic properties of sandwich structures; identification of sandwich and core material mechanical properties; and industrial applications and manufacturing. A few papers tackled more specific topics such as sandwich joining and manufacturing, or local and global sandwich panel stability. This book should be of interest to engineers and scientists in industry, as well as to professors and students in universities, and should help them keep abreast of developments in this rapidly growing field.