The paper presents an experimentally validated 3D finite element modelling impacts
of viscoelastic and natural materials. It considers, in particular, the material set
of ash wood and rubber in the context of the impact between the bat (the "hurley"
made of ash wood) and the ball (the "sliotar" made of polyurethane-cork composite)
in the Irish game of hurling. The hurley is highly anisotropic in its mechanical properties
and this impact system therefore presents a unique modelling challenge. The FE models
do not rely on either the assumption of linear materials models or on calibrated materials
models. The FE models are able to take all three geometric, status and material nonlinearities
into account yielding a close correlation with real-world impact scenario. The reported
FE results were validated against experimental measurements showing an excellent correlation
of more than 91% in term of maximum ball deformation.
