Abstract
In the context of spacecraft protection from orbital debris, a wide variety of shield designs revolving around multi shock panels (MSP) has been previously investigated. In parallel with these purpose-built shields there has been work done on understanding the protection capabilities of CFRP-AL honeycomb structures which are also impacted. A widely held view is that a honeycomb core sandwich panel performs poorly under hypervelocity impact (HVI), especially at low impact angles. By contrast, an MSP is very effective in dispersing the impact energy and stopping the projectile across a wide range of impact angles. The objective of this paper is to better understand the relative impact performance between multi shock panels and shields which contain honeycomb geometries in order to more effectively make use of the satellite structure in protecting the components inside a satellite. This research explores a novel shield geometry which combines a multi shock panel with corrugated walls with a honeycomb core in a design that can perform well both structurally and in impact.
