Abdolhossein Fereidoon - Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Semnan University, Semnan, Iran
Seyed Ali Taheri - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Islamic Azad University, Semnan Branch, Iran

Polymer foams commonly employ in the sporting, transport and building industries for weight reduction and passive safety applications, due to their light weight, good energy absorption capability and low cost of manufacture. In this paper, a 3D finite element model is developed to analyze the behavior of polymer foams. The present paper is most importantly aimed to evaluate macroscopic mechanical behavior starting from a micro-structural approach (Kelvin cell) for particular polymeric foam. The global macroscopic model (Polymeric foam block numerical model) is obtained replicating the unit cell in all the space directions. The commercial finite element software ABAQUS® is used for the Finite Element analysis. Further on, the numericalmodel is also validated using the Gibson Model and the experimental results as well. In addition, the influence of the cavity size on stress-strain behavior of foam is investigated

Polymer foam, Kelvin, Finite element method, macroscopic, micro-structural