Local–global buckling of cylindrical shells with wall thinning defects

Abstract

The influence of local thinning thickness defects on the buckling of cylindrical shells is investigated. A static buckling model of cylindrical shells with defects is established based on the Hamiltonian system. The complete symplectic eigensolutions of the cylindrical shell are superimposed to derive the buckling modes of the cylindrical shell with defects. A total of seven different cylindrical shells with axisymmetric and non-axisymmetric defects are considered. Local buckling modes can be captured by this new analytical model with symplectic methodology. By constraining the defect volume, the influence of different defect shapes on buckling of the cylindrical shell is investigated. Comparing with step defects and parabolic defects, the analysis concludes that defects of exponential function are more harmful to buckling of cylindrical shells. Highlights This article establishes a cylindrical shell model with arbitrary thickness changes under the Hamiltonian system and evaluates the buckling characteristics of cylindrical shells with thickness defects. A new symplectic approach is developed where the symplectic eigensolutions of the complete cylindrical shell are superimposed to obtain the corresponding buckling modes. Local buckling modes can be captured by this new analytical model. The occurrence of local buckling often drives a significant decrease in critical buckling load. The effects of defect parameters including location, depth, and shape on structure buckling are determined and analyzed.