Postbuckling Analysis of Geometrically Imperfect Conical Shells

Abstract

A suitable postbuckling analysis, based on geometrically nonlinear behavior, is developed for arbitrary imperfect conical shells. The conical shell was chosen as a representative case exhibiting the entire range of sensitivity to imperfection. A general symbolic code (using the MAPLE compiler) was programmed to create the differential operators of the nonlinear partial differential equations, based on Donnell’s type shell theory. The code then uses the Galerkin procedure, the Newton-Raphson and arc-length procedures, and a finite-differences scheme for automatic development of an efficient FORTRAN code. The code is used for parametric study of the nonlinear behavior and yields the sensitivity characteristic for a wide range of cone semivertex angles. A typical nonlinear behavior of a conical shell is investigated. Comparison with a simpler procedure, based on the initial postbuckling analysis (Koiter’s theory), confirms the need for the present more accurate one, especially for shells with prebuckling nonlinear behavior. The present investigation summarizes the sensitivity behavior with respect to imperfection shapes and amplitudes for the entire range of cone semivertex angles.