Axisymmetric postbuckling of orthotropic thin tapered circular plates

Abstract

This study deals with the geometrically non-linear postbuckling response of fibre-reinforced cylindrically orthotropic thin tapered circular plates subjected to an in-plane radial compressive load. Clamped and simply-supported plates with linear variation of thickness have been analysed. Von Kármán equations for orthotropic plates of varying thickness in terms of transverse displacement ω and stress function Ψ have been employed. Monomials are used as basis functions for ω and Ψ. An orthogonal point collocation method with zeros of a Legendre polynomial as collocation points has been used to solve the governing differential equations. The effect of orthotropic parameter and taper ratio has been investigated for clamped and simply-supported plates.