Stacking sequence optimization of laminated plate structures using the boundary element method

Abstract

In the present paper, we implement a pure boundary element method for the static analysis of 2D and 3D structures composed of thin, unsymmetric laminated composite plates. The domain integrals related to distributed loads are transformed into boundary integrals using the radial integration method. Furthermore, we apply an equilibrium-based procedure to directly recover the out-of-plane stress state from the classical laminated plate theory. Some benchmark examples verify the accuracy and efficiency of the present formulation, highlighting its steady convergence in regions of stress concentration near holes with sharp corners. To exploit the computational performance of the resulting boundary element code, we use the resulting code as the analysis step of an optimization scheme, taking fiber orientation angles as design variables.