Delaminations within the face sheets are often observed when a sandwich structure is exposed to impact loads. The buckling and postbuckling behavior of sandwich beams with delaminated faces is investigated in this work. The governing nonlinear equations, boundary conditions, and continuity conditions are formulated through variational principles. The beam construction consists of upper and lower, metallic or composite laminated symmetric skins, and a soft core of a foam or low strength honeycomb type. A high order theory is used for the core that accounts for the nonlinear distortion of the plane of section of the core and the compressibility in the vertical direction. The delamination considered is an interface crack, in which the substrate includes the transversely flexible core. The case of a debond at one of the skin-core interfaces is also included. The effects of the delamination length and location on the overall and local behavior are examined with an arbitrary initial imperfection.
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