Influence of HT on energy absorption in CLS compression process

Paper honeycomb and EPE are widely used in the field of packaging protection and safety transportation. Given the cushioning and protective function of unilateral and bilateral composite layered structures (CLSs) including polyethylene foam (EPE) and paper honeycomb, this work focused on analyzing the energy absorption (EA) and compression deformation of honeycomb thickness (HT) CLS under diverse drop impact (DI) status. Experimental observation showed that the increase of HT can improve the impact resistance of EPE and its CLSs. For the CLS with the HTs of 10, 15, 20, and 25 mm, the increase of paper HT may reduce the EA at low impact energy, while enhancing the EA capability at high impact energy. However, the EA of CLSs with a large HT of 70 mm is relatively poor. For the same drop weight mass or impact energy, the stroke efficiency (SE) and specific energy absorption (SEA) of the unilateral CLS with the same HT are, respectively, increased by 39.1% and 16.2%, so the EA of the unilateral CLS is superior to the bilateral CLS.