Structural Optimization of a Sandwich Panels Design for Minimum Weight Shipping and Airplane Containers

There are many technical discussions between global manufacturing and development companies competing to design a lightweight container to satisfy the requirements of shipping and airline companies. In this study, a methodology for a minimum weight optimization for honeycomb core sandwich panels with composite face sheets is presented, which can be primarily used for manufacturing of the walls, floor and roof of containers. The honeycomb sandwich panels consisted of symmetric composite face sheets the face sheets consisted of E-glass / epoxy fiber-reinforced plastic. The lay-up of the fibers of the face sheets was limited to sets of plies having orientation angles of 0 and 90. The new lightweight containers provide considerable savings in weight and thus reduce fuel consumption or increase aircraft turnover compared to conventional containers (see Fig. 1). According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA) calculations, the weight of fuel required to carry 1kg additional weight per hour is 0.04 Kg. The weight of the sandwich structure panels considered is the objective function subject to constraints needed based on the stiffness, face sheets failure, skin wrinkling and core shear. MATHLAB software was used to obtain theoretical results and compare them with numerical and experimental results. The strategies of composite sandwich structures depended on classical lamination theory. The program calculates the ply failures automatically by using the Tsai–Hill failure criterion for every combination of face sheet and core thicknesses.