Strain Rate Testing  is a full colour 104 page handbook that will provide guidelines to generate tensile strain rate test data for ferrous and non-ferrous sheet metals for use in finite element based automotive crash simulation tools. Specifically, measurement of the strength hardening in a sheet material resulting from strain rate testing using a high speed servo hydraulic test machine. Additionally, to provide guidelines to process raw test data, fit material model and format this data for application in crash simulation tools.

It is not within the scope of these recommendations to advocate a material model to fit to strain rate test results, although useful models are referenced. Rather to give guidance on the error allowance in fitting model to test results. These guidelines are expected to have broader application in the transport industry sector.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Aim of Recommendations
2. Abbreviations and Symbols
3. Test Machine Requirements
4. Specimens
5. Measurements (Sample Chapter, click on link above to view now)
6. Data Processing
7. General Definitions
8. Strength Hardening Constitutive Relations to Model Material Strain Rate Dependency
9. References
10. Annex

Sample Chapter now available, click on link above to view Chapter 5 now

Available in Softback Only

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr Paul Wood is a professional Mechanical Engineer, who has wide experience in manufacturing and product design within the transportation industry to include rail, aerospace and automotive sectors.  He started his working life as an apprentice at Westinghouse, gaining on the job industry training in the Manufacture and Development of Train Brake Systems. He graduated from Aston University in Birmingham with an upper second in Mechanical Engineering. He completed a three year manufacturing based research study, which was funded directly by the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority, gaining a PhD. 

 He is currently Lead Engineer in Materials Technology for crash safety applications within the International Automotive Research Centre at the University of Warwick. He is the UK nominated principal expert on BSI's standards committee to develop a European and International high strain rate tensile testing standard for sheet metals and alloys using servo-hydraulic machines. He has published and presented many technical papers relating to the procedural aspects of strain rate testing and materials modelling.

RECENT REVIEW

"The book provides practical guidelines to model the elasto-plastic material behaviour in explicit finite element codes such as LS-Dyna using the test data generated using a high-speed tensile testing machine. Testing and data processing procedures to take raw material data from the testing laboratory to the simulation model are illustrated with several examples, rendering the book a valuable handbook for practitioners performing crash simulation studies...

A spreadsheet-based methodology is provided as a recommendation to transform the raw data obtained the tests to a material data card for LS-Dyna in a systematic and lucid manner. Although the testing techniques and recommendations, developed with collaboration with several automotive industry partners, are for automotive crash safety computation, they are equally applicable in any structural impact application."
By Dr. Prabhakar Marur, India Science Lab, General Motors Tech Center - June 2009