Cellular Materials for Blast and Ballistic Protection

Cellular Materials (also known as foams) are two phases materials in which a continuous gas phase has been dispersed in a solid phase. Solid phase can be made from polymers, metals, or ceramics.

Foams and other highly porous materials with a cellular structure are known to have many interesting combinations of physical and mechanical properties, such as high stiffness in conjunction with very low specific weight or high gas permeability combined with high thermal conductivity.

Because of the strict requirements on the tactical mobility and airlift of military vehicles, the further increase in the armour weight is unacceptable. The foam itself does not have ability to absorb the energy of projectile because the projectile loading is realized on a very small area. The solution may be a combination of metallic foam with other advanced materials.

Aluminium foam samples are being produced and investigated at Faculty of mechanical engineering and naval architecture in Zagreb in the last decade.

In this paper, the process of producing aluminium foam samples are described. Also, several possible solutions for blast and ballistic protection with cellular materials are presented.