Asymmetrical Buckling of Prestressed Tapered Arches

Abstract

Prestressed arches with different cross‐sectional forms (tapered and prismatic) are investigated by formulating the problem as a two‐point nonlinear boundary‐value problem. The arches are subjected to a constant live load and the intensity of structural self‐weight is increased to determine symmetric and asymmetric limit loads, bifurcation points and postbuckling equilibrium paths. The investigation uses an algorithm based on a shooting method to solve the system of governing coupled nonlinear differential equations. It is shown that symmetric limit loads of tapered‐out arches with tapering angle