Buckling and Postbuckling Behavior of Stiffened Laminated Composite Panels

Abstract

The buckling and postbuckling behaviors were sutdied analytically and experimentally for stiffened laminated composite panels under compression loading. The panels with I-, blade, -and hat-shapeed stiffeners were investigated. In the analysis, the stiffened panels were anlyzed using the nonlinear finite element method combined with an improved arc-length method. The progressive failure analysis was done by adopting the maximum stress criterion and complete unloading failure model. The effects of the fiber angles were investigated on the buckling and postbuckling behaviors. In the experiment, the web and the lower cap of each stiffener were formed by the continuous lay-up of the skin for cocuring the stiffened panels. Therefore, the separation between stiffener and skin was not found in the junction part even after postbuckling ultimate load and the stiffened panels had excellent postbuckling load carrying capacity. A shadow moire thchnique was used to monitor the out-of-plane deformations of the panels. The piezoelectric films were attached to the panels to get the failure characteristics of the panel. The analytical results on the buckling load, postbuckling ultimate load, and failure pattern showed good agreement with the experimental results.