Abstract: When a high-speed penetrator carrying detection equipment penetrates planetary bodies at high speed， the scientific instruments in it are impacted by high g value and easily damaged. The buffer protection structure for scientific instrumentation is essential for improving the survival rate. This work suggested a penetrator with a multi-layered energy absorbing structure where the foam-filled thin-wall structure (abbreviated as FTS) is applied to the penetrating vibration-damping structure to improve the survival rate of the penetrator. The penetrating process of the penetrator into the planetary medium is simulated in LS-DYNA. Then， the reliability of the penetrator’s finite element model was verified by the impulse response test and simulation. The results suggest that FTS has a beneficial effect on isolation impact and energy absorption and provides an important solution for the research and development of penetrator engineering prototype.

Key words: penetrator, aluminum foam-filled thin-wall structure, buffer protection, impact response, penetration