Response and failure of metal tanks from impulsive spot loading: Experiments and calculations

A series of experiments were performed to determine the impulse intensity of a spot load that would cause failure in pressurized and unpressurized thin aluminum tanks. Strain histories in the vicinity of the failure were successfully recorded in several of the experiments. Finite element analyses of four experiments were performed to determine the details of the strain histories at the failure locations. Verification of the finite clement modeling techniques are provided in a detailed comparison of strain histories for one of the experiments. A simple failure criterion, based on observations from the experimental and computational responses and additional biaxial tension tests, is used to predict the failure of the tanks.