Abstract
Structural members commonly employed in marine and off-shore structures are usually fabricated from plates and shells. Collision of this class of structures is usually modeled as plate and shell structures subjected to dynamic impact loading. The understanding of the dynamic response and energy transmission of the structures subjected to low velocity impact is useful for the efficient design of this type of structures. The transmissions of transient energy flow and dynamic transient response of these structures under low velocity impact are presented in the paper. The structural intensity approach is adopted to study the elastic transient dynamic characteristics of the plate structures under low velocity impact. The nine-node degenerated shell elements are adopted to model both the target and impactor in the dynamic impact response analysis. The structural intensity streamline representation is introduced to interpret energy flow paths for transient dynamic response of the structures. Numerical results, including contact force and transient energy flow vectors as well as structural intensity stream lines, demonstrate the efficiency of the present approach and attenuating impact effects on this type of structures.