Developing a New Manufacturing Method and Numerical and Experimental Investigation of Buckling Behaviour of Cylindrical Fish Cell Metastructure

Fish cell cellular metastructures have received wide interest from researchers due to their zero Poisson ratio behaviour. However, their production, which is mainly based on additive manufacturing processes, is one of their limitations. Therefore, in this research, a new method based on the conventional manufacturing processes including laser cutting and metal forming was presented for the production of metallic cylindrical metastructures. Two samples were manufactured using this method and their quality was verified using mechanical and non-destructive tests. The samples’ mechanical and buckling behaviour under uniaxial compression were simulated using ABAQUS FEM package and experimentally validated. This was followed by the effects of the metastructures’ geometrical parameters including the cylinder diameter, height and thickness on their linear buckling being investigated numerically, and the results compared with the outcome of classic theories for conventional cylinder buckling. The results showed that these metastructures can be produced successfully with the conventional manufacturing processes, and t the buckling behaviour of these metastructures does not follow the classical buckling theories of cylinders; their buckling behaviour shows much lower sensitivity to the thickness and radius changes in comparison with conventional cylinders.