• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.359-367
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• 1994

The stability behaviour of symmetrically laminated rectangular composite plates with loaded ends clamped and unloaded edges simply-supported, and subjected to uniform in-plane compression is investigated. A numerical and experimental investigation is presented in this contribution. The stacking sequence of the laminated glass/epoxy composite plates is symmetric about the middle surface and consists of 8-ply [0, 90, +45, -45]s lamination. Numerical predictions were obtained through the use of the finite element method. The above plates were modelled with 8-noded isoparametric layered shell elements. The effect of the input parameters such as the degree and forms of prescribed initial imperfection and the incremental step size required for incremental loading, on the convergence of the solution is thoroughly examined. Experimental results are presented for 10 test panels. All test panels were made from glass/epoxy unidirectional prepregs and have aspect ratio of 5.088. The laminate thicknesses were found to vary from 1.054 mm to 1.066 mm. Comparison of experimental data with predicted results show good correlation and give confidence in the finite element model.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.61 no.2
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• pp.255-266
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• 2017

In this study, self-supporting roofing elements especially convenient for large-span structures such as stadium, airport terminal, mall, coliseum, etc. were examined with respect to critical buckling load. These elements were assumed as laminated composite plates and, variation of free-edge forms, cutout types and lamination configurations were used as design parameters. Based on the architectural feature and structural requirements, the effects of curvilinear free-edge form on critical buckling load were focused on in this research. Within this scope, 14 types of lamination configuration were specified according to various orientation angle, number and thickness of plies with a constant value of total plate thickness. Besides that, 6 different types of cutout and 3 different free-edge forms were determined. By combining all these parameters 294 different critical buckling load analyses were performed by using ANSYS Mechanical software based on finite element method. Effects of those parameters on critical buckling load were evaluated referring to the obtained results. According to the results presented here, it may be concluded that lamination conditions have more significant influence on the critical buckling load values than the other parameters. On the other hand, it is perceived that curvilinear free-edge forms explicitly undergo changings depending on lamination conditions. For future work, existence of delamination might be considered and progression of the defect could be investigated by using non-linear analysis.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.74 no.5
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• pp.577-588
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• 2020

A unified solution is presented for the buckling analysis of rectangular laminated composite plates with elastically restrained edges. The plate is subjected to biaxial in-plane compression, and the boundary conditions are simulated by employing uniform distribution of linear and rotational springs at all edges. The critical values of buckling loads and corresponding modes are calculated based on classical lamination theory and using the Ritz method. The deflection function is defined based on simple polynomials without any auxiliary function. The verifications of the current study are carried out with available combinations of classic boundary conditions in the literature. Through parametric study with a wide range of spring factors with some classical as well as some not classical boundary conditions, competency of the present model of boundary conditions is proved.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.713-732
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• 2016

A novel four variable refined plate theory is proposed in this work for laminated composite plates. The theory considers a parabolic distribution of the transverse shear strains, and respects the zero traction boundary conditions on the surfaces of the plate without employing shear correction coefficient. The displacement field is based on a novel kinematic in which the undetermined integral terms are used, and only four unknowns are involved. The analytical solutions of antisymmetric cross-ply and angle-ply laminates are determined via Navier technique. The obtained results from the present model are compared with three-dimensional elasticity solutions and results of the first-order and the other higher-order theories reported in the literature. It can be concluded that the developed theory is accurate and simple in investigating the bending and buckling responses of laminated composite plates.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.45 no.5
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• pp.677-691
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• 2013

A semi-analytical finite strip method is developed for analyzing the post-buckling behavior of rectangular composite laminated plates of arbitrary lay-up subjected to progressive end-shortening in their plane and to normal pressure loading. In this method, all the displacements are postulated by the appropriate harmonic shape functions in the longitudinal direction and polynomial interpolation functions in the transverse direction. Thin or thick plates are assumed and correspondingly the Classical Plate Theory (CPT) or Higher Order Plate Theory (HOPT) is applied. The in-plane transverse deflection is allowed at the loaded ends of the plate, whilst the same deflection at the unloaded edges is either allowed to occur or completely restrained. Geometric non-linearity is introduced in the strain-displacement equations in the manner of the von-Karman assumptions. The formulations of the finite strip methods are based on the concept of the principle of the minimum potential energy. The Newton-Raphson method is used to solve the non-linear equilibrium equations. A number of applications involving isotropic plates, symmetric and unsymmetric cross-ply laminates are described to investigate the through-thickness shearing effects as well as the effect of pressure loading, end-shortening and boundary conditions. The study of the results has revealed that the response of the composite laminated plates is particularly influenced by the application of the Higher Order Plate Theory (HOPT) and normal pressure loading. In the relatively thick plates, the HOPT results have more accuracy than CPT.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.49 no.5
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• pp.569-595
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• 2014

In this paper, a novel semi-energy finite strip method (FSM) is developed based on the concept of first order shear deformation theory (FSDT) in order to attempt the post-buckling solution for thin and relatively thick functionally graded (FG) plates under uniform end-shortening. In order to study the effects of through-the-thickness shear stresses on the post-buckling behavior of FG plates, two previously developed finite strip methods, i.e., semi-energy FSM based on the concept of classical laminated plate theory (CLPT) and a CLPT full-energy FSM, are also implemented. Moreover, the effects of aspect ratio on initial post-buckling stiffness of FG rectangular plates are studied. It has been shown that the variation of the ratio of initial post-buckling stiffness to pre-buckling stiffness ($S^*/S$) with respect to aspects ratios is quite independent of volume fractions of constituents in thin FG plates. It has also been seen that the universal curve representing the variation of ($S^*/S$) with aspect ratio of a FG plate demonstrate a saw shape curve. Moreover, it is revealed that for the thin FG plates in contrast to relatively thick plates, the variations of non-dimensional load versus end-shortening is independent of ceramic-metal volume fraction index. This means that the post-buckling behavior of thin FG plates and the thin pure isotropic plates is similar. The results are discussed in detail and compared with those obtained from finite element method (FEM) of analysis. The study of the results may have a great influence in design of FG plates encountering post-buckling behavior.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.821-832
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• 2019

An analysis on thermal buckling and postbuckling of composite laminated plates reinforced with a low amount of graphene platelets is performed in the current investigation. It is assumed that graphaene platelets are randomly oriented and uniformly dispersed in each layer of the composite media. Elastic properties of the nanocomposite media are obtained by means of the modified Halpin-Tsai approach which takes into account the size effects of the graphene reinforcements. By means of the von $K{\acute{a}}rm{\acute{a}}n$ type of geometrical nonlinearity, third order shear deformation theory and nonuniform rational B-spline (NURBS) based isogeometric finite element method, the governing equations for the thermal postbuckling of nanocomposite plates in rectangular shape are established. These equations are solved by means of a direct displacement control strategy. Numerical examples are given to study the effects of boundary conditions, weight fraction of graphene platelets and distribution pattern of graphene platelets. It is shown that, with introduction of a small amount of graphene platelets into the matrix of the composite media, the critical buckling temperature of the plate may be enhanced and thermal postbuckling deflection may be alleviated.

• Composites Research
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.185-190
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• 2019

This work investigates the elastic buckling characteristics of laminated composite trapezoidal corrugated plates with simply supported edges using the analytical method. In the analysis, three types of in-plane loading conditions: uniaxial, biaxial and shear loads are considered. Because it is very difficult to determine the mechanical behavior of 3-dimensional corrugated structures analytically, the equivalent homogenization model is adapted to investigate the overall mechanical behavior of corrugated plates. The corrugated element is homogenized as an orthotropic material. The previous formulae for bending rigidities of corrugated plate are adapted in this paper. The comparisons of the proposed analytical results with those of FEA based on the shell element are made to verify the proposed analytical method. In the comparison study both the critical buckling loads and the buckling mode shapes are presented. Some numerical results are presented to check the effect of the geometric properties.

• Advances in Computational Design
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.209-231
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• 2020

In order to evaluate the performance of three heuristic optimization algorithms, namely, simulated annealing (SA), genetic algorithm (GA) and particle swarm optimization (PSO) for optimal stacking sequence of laminated composite plates with respect to critical buckling load and non-dimensional natural frequencies, a multi-objective optimization procedure is developed using the weighted summation method. Classical lamination theory and first order shear deformation theory are employed for critical buckling load and natural frequency computations respectively. The analytical critical buckling load and finite element calculation schemes for natural frequencies are validated through the results obtained from literature. The comparative study takes into consideration solution and computational time parameters of the three algorithms in the statistical evaluation scheme. The results indicate that particle swarm optimization (PSO) considerably outperforms the remaining two methods for the special problem considered in the study.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.43 no.5
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• pp.639-660
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• 2022

The bending and buckling behaviours of FG-GRNC laminated sandwich plates are investigated by using novel five-variables quasi 3D higher order shear deformation plate theory by considering the modified continuum nonlocal strain gradient theory. To calculate the effective Young's modulus of the GRNC sandwich plate along the thickness direction, and Poisson's ratio and mass density, the modified Halpin-Tsai model and the rule of the mixture are employed. Based on a new field of displacement, governing equilibrium equations of the GRNC sandwich plate are solved using a developed approach of Galerkin method. A detailed parametric analysis is carried out to highlight the influences of length scale and material scale parameters, GPLs distribution pattern, the weight fraction of GPLs, geometry and size of GPLs, the geometry of the sandwich plate and the total number of layers on the stresses, deformation and critical buckling loads. Some details are studied exclusively for the first time, such as stresses and the nonlocality effect.