An Anisotropy Honeycomb Structure with Reinforced Deformability and Stiffness

In this work, by breaking the structural six-fold symmetry and isotropy, we propose a simple design to drastically improve the elastic deformability and stiffness of gardenia-shaped honeycomb (GSH) structures, with a lower structural relative density. In the developed structural design, the enhancement of the mechanical response is achieved by locally shortening the beams that caused the intracellular extrusion. Studies that focused on simultaneously strengthening the two above-mentioned characteristics are rarely seen. Unlike the isotropy of the previous GSH structures, the elastic modulus of the reinforced GSH (RGSH) structures in both two principal directions is investigated via performing a complete parametric study. To visualize the utterly different mechanical response between the GSH and RGSH structures, the elastic properties-comparison are presented theoretically, numerically, and experimentally. The developed structural reinforcing method, combining the stiffness and deformability regulation, provides a valuable way to redesign multifunctional lattice structures for meeting the various requirements regarding mechanical characteristics.