Study of an auxetic structure made of tubes and corrugated sheets

Materials and structures with negative Poisson's ratio are characterized as auxetics. They are interesting for engineering applications due to their non-conventional behavior. However, most of the auxetic structures suffer with a disadvantage that they are difficult to be fabricated because of their complicated geometry structure. To overcome this problem, an auxetic structure made of tubes and corrugated sheets using conventional technology is proposed in this study. Its auxetic effect is investigated by both geometrical analysis and finite element method. For validating the analyses, a real auxetic structure is made with aluminum material and tested under compression condition. All the results obtained show that the proposed structure has very significant negative Poisson's ratio effect under compression. The study has provided a simple way to fabricate auxetic structure for using in a wide range of industrial fields at a low cost. KGaA, Weinheim.