Fiber metal laminate (FML) is gaining increased interest among researchers in designing thin-walled tubes as an efficient energy absorber. The combination of aluminum tube and fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) as an FML hybrid tube has successfully demonstrated enhanced crashworthiness performance of structures. Previous studies reported FML hybrid tubes employing a single type of FRP composite material as the laminate material. Investigations on the effect of stacking sequences of multiple types of FRP composite as laminate materials are limited and mostly focused on sandwich structures. This study aims to investigate the effect of reinforcement material as a laminate layer and stacking sequences on the crashworthiness characteristics of aluminum-FRP hybrid tubes under quasi-static axial compression loading. The crashworthiness characteristics and the failure behavior of aluminum monolithic tube, aluminum-single FRP material, and aluminum-multi FRP material hybrid tubes are tested and compared. Glass FRP (GFRP) demonstrates great potential as a laminate material for aluminum tube compared with carbon FRP (CFRP). Aluminum-GFRP and aluminum-GFRP-CFRP hybrid tubes exhibit a 26.4 % and 66.9 % increase in energy absorbed, respectively, compared with the monolithic aluminum tube. The specific energy absorption and crushing force efficiency of the aluminum-GFRP-CFRP hybrid tube show minimal reductions of 4.9 % and 6.2 %, respectively. GFRP is the better choice of laminate material for aluminum tubes compared with CFRP. Multiple FRP laminates show a larger crashworthiness enhancement of FRP hybrid tubes in achieving better crashworthiness performance of the energy absorber. These findings imply that the selection and stacking sequences of laminate material are vital in tailoring the performance of the hybrid tubes toward efficient energy absorbers.
