Three-point bending of an expanded-tapered sandwich beam—Analytical and numerical FEM study

•Analytical model of expanded-tapered sandwich beam is formulated, with consideration of the shear effect.•Modeling of sandwich structure with consideration of the broken-line hypothesis (zig-zag theory).•Study of three-point bending of simply supported expanded-tapered sandwich beam.•Numerical FEM studies of the beam.•Comparison of analytical and numerical results. The paper is devoted to expanded-tapered sandwich beam under three-point bending. The analytical model of the beam based on the broken-line hypothesis (zig-zag theory) is developed. The maximum deflection of the beam with consideration of the shear effect is analytically determined. Moreover, a numerical FEM model (SolidWorks) of the beam is formulated. The maximum deflections of example beams with the use of two methods are calculated and compared. The results are specified in Tables.