In-plane elastic property prediction of straight-arc coupled auxetic structures

Abstract Auxetic metamaterials with two components exhibit a wide variety of potential engineering applications due to their exotic mechanical properties. In this work, a novel straight-arc coupled structure (SACS) is designed by introducing a circular arc structure to a classical re-entrant structure. This work aims to explore the linear and geometrical nonlinear mechanical of SACS at large strains. According to Castigliano’s second theorem, the in-plane linear theoretical model is established to obtain equivalent Poisson’s ratio and elastic modulus. A geometrical nonlinear model is further established based on large deflection theory and chain algorithm. The finite element method is used to verify the prediction of the theoretical solution, and linear and nonlinear mechanical properties of the SACS are studied by numerical simulation. The influence of geometric parameter re-entrant angle and arc radius on the mechanical properties of the SACS is investigated to compare the linear and nonlinear mechanical properties. The linear numerical simulation of SACS with two transverse ribs (SACS-TR) and classical re-entrant honeycomb structure with two transverse ribs (CRS-TR) is carried out to analyze the in-plane elastic properties. These results demonstrate that considering the geometric nonlinear model can predict the actual structural deformation more accurately, which is verified by the quasi-static compression experiment results at large strains. The SACS design can enhance the auxetic effect and structure Young’s moduli under the same dimension.