CT-BASED RECONSTRUCTION OF CLOSED-CELL ALUMINUM FOAMS

Abstract

Closed-cell aluminum foam is the type of foam where its pores are closed, forming a pocket of air or a bubble. Closed-cell aluminum foam is used in different fields, such as aerospace, structural, railway, shipbuilding, and many others, because of its lightweight, sound and vibration absorption properties, excellent heat insulation, non-combustibility, environmental friendliness, mechanical damping, and many other properties. A closed-cell aluminum foam have a complex internal structure, which makes it challenging to build its 3D and 2D geometric models for further studies. This study aims to conduct a parametric modeling of the closed-cell aluminum foam using CT (computed tomography) images of the foam to reconstruct 3D models with Materialise Mimics V26 software and 3-Matics V18 (its twin). The reconstruction will be conducted by varying different parameters, like segmentation and other mesh-processing parameters, to develop models. The geometric properties of these models will be compared to the actual measured geometric properties to determine which set of parameters gives the accurate model.