NUMERICAL SIMULATIONS OF THE INFLUENCE OF STRIKER BAR LENGTH ON SHPB MEASUREMENTS

Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar (SHPB) has become a frequently used technique for measuring uni-axial compressive stress-strain relationship of various engineering materials under high strain rates. The pulse shape generated in the incident bar is sensitive to the length of the striker bar. In this paper, a finite element simulation of a Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar is performed to estimate the effect of varying length of striker bar on the stress-strain relationship of a material. A series of striker bars with different lengths, from 200mm to 350mm, are employed to obtain the stress-strain response of AL6061-T6 in both simulation and experiment. A comparison is made between the experimental and the computed stress-strain curves. Finally the influence of variation of striker bar length on the sample's stress-strain response is presented.