Postbuckling of imperfect stiffened cylindrical shells under combined external pressure and heating

Abstract

A postbuckling analysis is presented for a stiffened cylindrical shell of finite length subjected to combined loading of external pressure and a uniform temperature rise. The formulations are based on a boundary layer theory of shell buckling, which includes the effects of nonlinear prebuckling deformations, nonlinear large deflections in the postbuckling range and initial geometrical imperfections of the shell. The “smeared stiffener” approach is adopted for the stiffeners. The analysis uses a singular perturbation technique to determine the interactive buckling loads and the postbuckling equilibrium paths. Numerical examples cover the performances of perfect and imperfect, stringer and ring stiffened cylindrical shells. Typical results are presented in dimensionless graphical form.