Modeling and Simulation of Tube with HiSiMo Ductile Iron under High Speed Impact

Rotor failure in housings at high rotational speed is a critical event in the automotive and aerospace industry. The design of the containment housing that encloses the rotor burst is important to ensure the safety of the surrounding area. It is essential to perform rotor containment testing and numerical simulation study. This paper first presents the results of a series of regular disk with same geometry and tube with different thickness containment testing. The disk is made of nickel base alloy and the tube is made of high silicon molybdenum (HiSiMo) ductile iron. The regular disk is released at certain rotating speed which subsequently impacts the inner wall of the tube with uniform thickness. Three groups of tests are conducted at the high speed rotor spin testing facility in the laboratory with different disk rotating speed and tube thickness. Then numerical simulations are carried out using nonlinear finite element method to repeat and study the impact process. The simulation results show good correlation with test results including the prediction of containment, tube perforation and overall deformation. The constitutive model with high strain rate and material failure criteria for HiSiMo ductile iron in the simulation are reasonable. Current regular rotor containment testing and numerical simulation methods will be extended to actual automotive and aerospace engine cases involving more complex rotors with nickel base alloy and housings with HiSiMo ductile iron.