Finite element simulation of deformation behaviour of cellular rubber components

This paper presents a new prospect of investigating the mechanical behaviour of cellular rubber using porous hyperelastic material model. There are number of hyperelastic material models to describe the behaviour of homogeneous elastomer, but very few to characterise the complex properties of cellular rubber. The analysis of dependence of material behaviour on pore density using the new material model is supported with experiments to characterise the actual material behaviour. The new material model which is based on Danielsson et al 1] decouples the influence of porosity from the mechanical properties of the solid material by introducing volume fraction of the pores as an explicit scalar variable. The finite element simulations are then followed by experiments on complex model to validate the material model. (© 2012 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)