Lightweight CFRP/wood sandwich composites receive considerable attention because they can be tailored to
satisfy many specifcations. Therefore, the damage modes during low velocity impact and compression after
impact (CAI) of CFRP/wood sandwich laminate with different wood core types are investigated in this article.
The effect of wood fber orientation on the specifc energy dissipation and CAI strength are studied. Results
demonstrated that the laminate with balsa core wood, where the wood fbers are perpendicular to the CFRP face
plies, shows higher impact load and dissipated energy due to the ability of wood cells to deform during impact
and hence dissipate more energy. However, the laminate with birch core, where the wood fbers are parallel to
the CFRP surface plies, reveals slightly larger CAI strength due to the role of wood fbers in sharing the load
during compression. The damage initiated in the balsa core sandwich laminates at the impacted face and
propagate to the unimpacted CFRP surface, while the opposite damage behavior occurs for the birch core
sandwich laminate. The balsa core laminate showed larger specifc impact load (load/density), dissipated energy
(dissipated energy/density), and CAI strength (strength/density), reaching 2.21-, 2.24-, and 1.41-fold times
compared to birch core laminates.