Computational Structural mechanics: From aeronautics to Shape memory alloys

Abstract

Typically, the structure of any project is as follows: proposal of the problem, justifying the research, development of the project and conclusions regarding the original problem. But sometimes setbacks appear, unexpected turns that impede the normal line of the project. This paper suffered several setbacks favoring a totally different structure to a conventional one: it is composed of three sub-projects, of which two of them do not share the conclusions to the original problem. The first sub-project, Chapter 2, presents Preliminary design of a trolley for dismantling an aircraft at the end of life. The aeronautic private enterprise Avianor, in their quest to be a world leader in recycling aircraft, wanted a trolley to completely dismantle the plane in order to try to reuse all the aircraft¿s components and materials. Thus Avianor contacted the ¿Ecole de Technologie Superieure¿ in Montreal (Canada) and both established the guidelines to achieve a detailed design of the trolley. Unfortunately, a short time after beginning the project, Avianor did not wish to continue and the research only became the preliminary design of the trolley. The second sub-project, Chapter 3, describes the modelling and optimization of the structure of the material for orthopedic implants using numerical tools. After ending the first project, I was relocated by my tutor, the Dr. Terriault, to an entirely new field: the porous superelastic metal alloys for medical purposes within the branch of orthopedics. In this new project, the aim was to design porous structures and optimize them to obtain maximum compatibility with living tissue. In the absence of the manufacturing machine for the superelastic metal alloys due to economic reasons, an alternative plastic material during the study development was necessary. Regrettably, this material did not reproduce superelasticity behavior so this project had to stop too. However, when the manufacturing machine of the super alloy is available, the project development will continue. The third sub-project, Chapter 4, shows the Unit cell analysis of the superelastic behavior of open-cell tetrakaidecahedral shape memory alloy foam under quasi-static loading. In the previous project, one of the structures that were studied was the tetrakaidecahedral geometric. This structure is of great interest in the area of shape memory alloys, and luckily, at this moment the department was performing a research project whose geometry and methodology resembles the ones of the latter. I started to successfully collaborate in this project. It is worth to say that the results of this work have been sent to a JCR journal, ¿Computational Material Science¿. The title of the paper is ¿Unit cell analysis of the superelastic behavior of open-cell tetrakaidecahedral shape memory alloy foam under quasistatic loading¿.