Development of an innovative composite sandwich matting with GFRP facesheets and wood core

This paper presents the concept, design, fabrication, application and experimental validation of a new type of composite sandwich matting. The composite sandwich matting comprises a paulownia woods as core material and glass fiber reinforced plastic (GFRP) as face-skins and lattice-webs. The matting was fabricated by vacuum infusion moulding process (VIMP). The mechanical properties of the component materials were studied. Four-point bending tests were also performed to investigate the flexural properties of the paulownia wood core sandwich panels. The experimental results showed that the failure mode of the structures was upper facesheet compressive yielding. The structures have good integrity against transverse load, there was a large plateau region after the initial failure and can prevent the structures from catastrophic failure. The finite element (FE) analysis showed a good agreement with the experimental results in predicting the load-displacement curve. The developed composite sandwich matting has been successfully used in military engineering, emergency rescue and large infrastructure construction owing to its excellent mechanical properties.