The fatigue response of sandwich composite panels with an improved structure and different orientations to increase their fatigue resistance is investigated herein. In order to compare the fatigue performance of sandwich structures, a specific and instrumented ball drop tester was designed and developed. Different sandwich structures are analyzed. Composite materials here compose of E-Glass fibre matrix composite skin and a foam core. Usually the foam core is Polyuretene (P.U) and Polyphenolic

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... The latter structure is specially designed to improve crashworthiness for transport applications, aeronautical and space structures. The main results of this study are evaluation of the absorbing energy performance of the sandwich structures, subjected to a repeated impact of the sandwich panels up to fatigue, and the development of criteria useful for materials selection. These sandwich panels have shown a better performance in terms of impact energy absorbing properties and strength respect to traditional sandwich structures. The predicted fatigue behavior of sandwich panel compared fairly well with results from finite element analysis. Analytical predictions of these were also found to be in good agreement with experimental data. Specimen deformation behavior and fracture features are correlated to deformation curves obtained during the testing. Extensive experiments are carried out to characterize different oriented sandwich panels for the mechanical behavior as well.