Preparation and Three-point Bending Performance of Steel Foam Plate

In order to fabricate steel foams with high porosity,uniform pore structure and high-performance, steel foams with different porosities and cell sizes were fabricated by a sintering-dissolution process using 316L stainless steel powder as raw material and CaCl2 as pore forming agent, and steel foam-sandwich panels were fabricated by physical bonding. Three-point bending tests were carried out to explore the bending performance of steel foam and steel foam-sandwich panels. The influence of the porosity and cell size of foam sample on the bending load was analyzed and discussed,and the bending strength of steel foam -sandwich panel was compared with steel foam sample. The results show that the bending deformation of steel foam is started at the weakest cell wall firstly,then the cracks are initiated and propagated,eventually the macroscopic fracture is caused. For steel foam-sandwich panels,the maximum load is reduced from 2345 N to 1254 N when the porosity is increased from 69.4% to 82.5%,whereas the maximum bending load of steel foam-sandwich panels is increased by 15%-43% with the same porosity. When the cell size is increased from 1.9 mm to 3.9 mm and the porosity is about 73%,the maximum bending load is reduced from 2070 N to 1528 N,whereas the maximum bending load of steel foam-sandwich panels is increased by 15%-28% with the same pore size. Under the same porosity and pore size,the steel foam-sandwich panels have excellent resistance to bending at least 15% higher than the steel foam.