ABSTRACT

Thin cylindrical shells are widely used as important structural members in

the field of mechanical, civil, aerospace, marine and nuclear engineering structures.
The design of these cylindrical shell structures are often controlled by their buckling
behaviour when loaded in axial compression. It is a well known fact that the
manufacturing of thin cylindrical shells without imperfections is very difficult. The
buckling behaviour of thin cylindrical shells subjected to axial compression is highly
sensitive to the form and amplitude of geometrical imperfections. In order to predict
the buckling strength accurately, it is essential to model the geometrical
imperfections accurately. In this work only two types of geometrical imperfections
are considered for analysis. They are
1. Local geometrical imperfections namely dents
2. Distributed geometrical imperfections
The works in this thesis can be divided into three parts. The first part deals
about Finite Element analysis of localised geometrical imperfections namely a dent
on a perfect cylindrical shell model formed at half the height of the cylindrical shell
to determine the effects of dent sizes and angles of inclination on buckling behaviour
of thin cylindrical shells. Further, neighbourhoodness effect of two circumferential
dents, at half the height of a cylindrical shell, on the buckling of a thin cylindrical
shell is also studied in detail.
Two types of material models namely austenitic stainless steel and carbon
steel are taken for study.
The second part deals with the method of modeling of random geometrical
imperfections using eigen affine mode shapes of a perfect cylindrical shell with the
aim of comparing buckling behaviours of pairsof mirror image random geometrical
imperfect thin cylindrical shell models. In all random geometrical imperfection
models generated, either the RMS value of imperfections or the maximum amplitude
of imperfectioils is maintained constant. And also buckling behaviour of pairs of
mirror image imperfection patterns of other types of imperfections such as
axisymmetric and asymmetric imperfection patterns are also studied in detail. In
addition, buckling behaviows of pairs of mirror image random geometrical
imperfect thin panels and plates are studied. From the numerical results obtained
from the random geometrical imperfect thin cylindrical shell models, the calculation
of reliability of the structure is carried out using Mean Value First Order Second
Moment method.
The third part deals with the experimental comparison of buckling
behaviours of thin aluminum cylindrical shells with either a circumferential or a
longitudinal dent formed at half the height of the cylindrical shell with a cylindrical
shell without any dent.