Study on the penetration-harpoon attachment characteristics of a space harpoon to an aluminum honeycomb sandwich plate

Abstract

Aiming at the problem of harpoon attachment of harpoons to space debris with aluminum honeycomb as the skin in space, this paper studies the penetration-harpoon attachment effect of three kinds of harpoons on aluminum honeycomb sandwich plate under low-velocity impact environment by means of experiment and numerical simulation. Penetration tests of aluminum honeycomb sandwich plates were carried out on the ground with wingless, double-winged and three-winged harpoons. The results show that the more wings of the harpoon, the larger the reaming generated during the penetration process, and the stronger the penetration ability. A finite element model for the harpoon penetrating an aluminum honeycomb sandwich plate has been developed, and its accuracy has been validated through experimental comparison. In terms of harpoon adhesion force, the errors of simulation and experimental results are 4.55%, 2.46% and 8.78%, respectively, and the maximum error does not exceed 8.78%. After the harpoon penetrates the aluminum honeycomb sandwich plate, the harpoon attachment effect of the three-wing harpoon is the best, followed by the double-wing harpoon, and finally the wingless harpoon. On this basis, the penetration and adhesion ability of the three-winged harpoon to the rotating and rolling aluminum honeycomb target is simulated by numerical simulation. It is found that when the target has low speed rotation and rolling speed, it has little effect on the adhesion ability of the three-winged harpoon.