Use of The Finite Strip Method in Predicting The Behaviour

Use of the nite strip method in predicting the behaviour
of composite laminated structures

D.J. Dawe
*
School of Engineering, The University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK
Abstract
A description is given of the use of the nite strip method (FSM) in determining the behaviour of composite laminated, prismatic
plate and shell structures, with emphasis placed on relatively recent work conducted at The University of Birmingham. Both the
semi-analytical and the spline variants of the method are described, and some attention is also paid to exact strips. Consideration
is given to analyses conducted in the contexts of rst-order shear deformation theory and of classical, or thin, theory. The calcu-
lation of buckling stresses and natural frequencies of vibration is discussed in detail for single span structures and then, using the
spline nite strip approach with variable knot spacings, for multi-span structures and stepped structures. An account is given of the
use of the FSM in predicting the post-buckling response of plate structures to progressive end-shortening strain. Brief description is
given of the use of the method in predicting the thermal buckling and the transient response to dynamic loading of at plates.
Finally, the calculation of buckling stresses and natural frequencies of sandwich plate structures is considered, based on the
adoption of a three-zone plate theory. Numerous examples of the application of the FSM are included in the paper.
2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.
1. Introduction
Plate and shell structures occur as important struc-
tural components in a number of branches of en-
gineering, including mechanical, civil, marine and
aeronautical engineering. Often such structures are of
rectangular planform and are assemblies of component
at and/or curved plates which are rigidly connected
together at their longitudinal junction lines such that the
structure is basically prismatic. The nite strip method
(FSM) is an ecient and accurate method for the
analysis of this type of structure, of which Fig. 1 shows
typical examples. In this gure the structures are mod-
elled by a number of nite strips which run the length of
the structure. The individual strips have reference lines
(at which degrees of freedom are located) at their ex-
ternal longitudinal edges and may also have other lon-
gitudinal reference lines in their interiors. It is noted that
the FSM can be used in the analysis of structures of
other than rectangular planform, such as skew paral-
lelogrammic structures or structures curved in plan, but
here attention is restricted to rectangular prismatic
structures (except that change of thickness and physi-
cal properties is allowed along the structure). The
method can be used in the analysis of various types of
behavioural response but the concern in this paper is
with calculating natural frequencies and critical buck-
ling stresses (or critical temperature increases) and with
predicting post-buckling behaviour and response to
dynamic loading.
The FSM can be regarded generally as a specialisa-
tion of the ubiquitous nite element method (FEM) and,
of course, both methods can be viewed as multi-eld
forms of the traditional single-eld RayleighRitz
method. The properties of a strip are based on the use of
an assumed displacement eld in conjunction with po-
tential energy or virtual work principles. The rst pub-
lished FSM paper along these lines, by Cheung [1],
appeared in 1968 and concerned the linear static analysis
of single rectangular plates having a pair of opposite
ends simply supported. In the intervening years up to
the present time, very considerable development and use
of the method has taken place. The aim in this paper is
not to attempt to describe and discuss the full range of
FSM work that has been conducted by many investi-
gators over the years: the reader is referred to the early
texts of Cheung [2] and Loo and Cusens [3], and to
the recent text of Cheung and Tham [4] for general
*
Tel.: +44-121-414-5062; fax: +44-121-414-3675.
E-mail address: d.j.dawe@bham.ac.uk (D.J. Dawe).
0263-8223/02/$ - see front matter 2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.
PII: S0263- 8223( 02) 00059- 4
Composite Structures 57 (2002) 1136
www.elsevier.com/locate/compstruct
descriptions. Rather, the approach adopted is to con-
centrate attention on those particular, important types
of behavioural response of composite laminated struc-
tures which have already been mentioned and further,
and rather parochially perhaps, to focus the description
on work conducted in recent years by the author and
his co-workers at The University of Birmingham, al-
though references arising from other sources are noted
throughout the paper. In analysing the behaviour of
prismatic structures the FSM is very competitive with
the general FEM in terms of matters such as accuracy,
speed of solution and ease of data preparation. The
advantages of the FSM are particularly pronounced in
solving the eigenvalue-type problems of predicting nat-
ural frequencies and buckling stresses.
As well as the mainstream development of ap-
proximate energy-based or work-based nite strip ap-
proaches, it is noted that, for the prediction of natural
frequencies and buckling stresses of at-plate structures,
what may be termed an exact FSM may be used in some
circumstances, wherein the strip properties are based on
the direct solution of the governing dierential equa-
tions of classical plate theory, rather than on the use of
energy or work principles. It happens that it was also in
1968 that pioneering works in this area were published
by Wittrick [5,6] (at The University of Birmingham) and
by Smith [7].
The emphasis here is on the analysis of composite
laminated structures which may have the complication
of general material properties, including anisotropy and
coupling between in-surface and out-of-surface actions.
A further complication when considering the out-of-
surface behaviour of component plates of compact
composite construction, of other than very thin geo-
metry, is that it is often necessary to take account of
through-thickness shearing eects. The classical, thin
theory ignores these eects, of course, whilst shear de-
formation theories include them and provide improved
representations of structural behaviour. A number of
shear deformation theories exist in the literature, of
which the simplest is the well-known rst-order theory
(the ReissnerMindlin theory for at plates) and in what
follows it is only this theory which is considered when
including through-thickness shear eects. (Shear defor-
mation theories of higher order than rst order can also
be used in conjunction with the FSM, of course, but
their use has been limited and they are not considered
here. Unlike the rst-order theory they have the ad-
vantage of not requiring the prescription of shear cor-
rection factors but they also have some disadvantages
related to their relative complexity.) Structures of the
type considered here may also include component plates
which are of sandwich construction, in the popular
conguration of two outer faceplates and a thicker in-
terior core. Then the variation of displacement quanti-
ties through the thickness becomes potentially more
complicated and use of a three-zone theory becomes
appropriate.
The FSM exists in a number of variants, of which the
chief two may be referred to as the semi-analytical nite
strip method (S-a FSM) and the spline nite strip
method (spline FSM). These are distinguished, one from
another, by the nature of the variation of the displace-
ment quantities along the length of the strip. In the S-a
FSM use is made of a multi-term series of analytical
functions, i.e. trigonometric functions, beam eigenfunc-
tions etc, whilst in the spline FSM use is made of series
of polynomial spline functions, usually B-spline func-
tions. The S-a FSM and the spline FSM are com-
plementary procedures, with relative advantages and
disadvantages. In comparatively simple situations, such
as for orthotropic structures with diaphragm ends, the
S-a FSM can be the more accurate procedure: indeed,
where the true mode shape of buckling or vibration is
purely sinusoidal longitudinally, the S-a FSM analysis
can be based on the use of a single-term representation
of the displacements over one longitudinal half-wave. In
more general situations, however, the spline FSM is
much the more versatile procedure in incorporating
ansotropic material properties and dierent end condi-
tions.
In Section 2 a quite detailed description is given of the
development and use of the S-a FSM and the spline
FSM in predicting the buckling stresses and natural
frequencies of single-span composite laminated plate
and shell structures. In Section 3 this description is ex-
tended in the context of the spline FSM to embrace plate
structures which may be multi-span or may have step
changes of thickness or other physical property along
their lengths. The use of both variants of the FSM in
predicting the post-buckling response of plate structures
is described in Section 4. In Section 5 some consider-
ation is given to predicting the eect of thermal loading
on the buckling behaviour of rectangular plates, using
the spline FSM. Finite strip work of both FSM variants
Fig. 1. Typical prismatic structures modelled with nite strips.
12 D.J. Dawe / Composite Structures 57 (2002) 1136
in the area of transient dynamic response is described
briey in Section 6. The last technical area considered, in
Section 7, looks at the spline FSM analysis of the
buckling and free vibration of sandwich plate structures,
and incorporates a rened model of through-thickness
behaviour. Finally, concluding remarks are given in
Section 8.
In what follows the notations SDST, TST, SDPT and
CPT are used to denote rst-order shear deformation
shell theory, thin shell theory, rst-order shear defor-
mation plate theory and classical plate theory, respec-
tively.
2. Buckling and vibration of single-span plate and shell
structures
2.1. Background
It is in the prediction of buckling stresses and natural
frequencies of single-span prismatic structures that the
FSM has found its greatest usage and for which the
volume of literature is largest. Here, although a con-
siderable number of references in this sphere of work is
noted, the list of references is nevertheless by no means
complete. Indeed the attention is almost exclusively di-
rected to those references dealing with the FSM analysis
of the buckling and/or vibration of plate and shell
structures, as distinct from with single at or curved
plates. The reader is referred to an earlier work of the
author [8] for details of further FSM work (up to 1995)
involving single plates.
Although the so-called exact FSM, mentioned in
Section 1, is not the approach pursued in this paper
some remarks on this approach are appropriate here.
Wittrick [5,6] derived properties for an istropic, at
component plate of a plate structure by solving explic-
itly the governing dierential equations (of plane stress
and of CPT) for the situation in which the mode shape
of buckling or vibration varies purely sinusoidally in the
longitudinal direction. By formulating the analysis in
terms of complex quantities [6] each component plate
can accommodate applied shear stress as well as biaxial
direct stresses. The assumption of sinusoidal variation
results in a convenient single-term type of analysis over
one half-wavelength of a mode, but where nodal lines
are skewed such assumption is strictly true only for a
structure of innite length. In the absence of applied
shear stress, and of anisotropic material behaviour, the
single-term analysis is perfectly satisfactory for dia-
phragm-supported structures of any length, since then
the mode shapes are such that the nodal lines across a
structure are straight and parallel to the ends. Related
developments to those of Wittrick have been described
by Smith [7] (for orthotropic material and applied bi-
axial direct stresses only) and by Viswanathan et al.
[9,10] whose analysis embraces assemblies of curved as
well as at component plates and anisotropic material
[10]. The exact approach of Wittrick [5,6] has been ex-
tended to incorporate a certain level of anisotropic
material behaviour (but not for membrane properties
and with no bendingstretching coupling) in the VI-
PASA analysis capability of Wittrick and Williams [11].
This single-term capability also incorporates a sophis-
ticated solution procedure with the use of multi-level
substructuring [12], to determine buckling stresses and
natural frequencies of complicated plate structures,
corresponding to specied values of the half-wavelength.
The scope of this type of analysis has been extended
later by the use of Lagrangian multipliers to incorporate
a set of constraints, such as are associated with regularly
repeating interior supports or with closely matching the
end conditions, in the programs VICON [13,14] and
VICONPT [15]. Collectively, the exact FSM approaches
are sophisticated, accurate and powerful but inevitably
they lack something of the versatility associated with the
approximate energy-based or work-based FSM ap-
proaches.
In the context of CPT, and of the use of the ap-
proximate S-a FSM, the analysis of the buckling and
vibration of at-plate structures has been considered by,
amongst others, Cheung and Cheung [16], Turvey and
Wittrick [17], Przemieniecki [18], Plank and Wittrick
[19], Petyt [20], Graves-Smith and Sridharan [21],
Sridharan [22,23] and Mahendran and Murray [24].
Some of these analyses are of the single-term type [17
19,2224], with the works of Refs. [19] and [24] allowing
skewed nodal lines, whilst others are of the more ver-
satile multi-term type [16,20,21]. Extensions to embrace
thin curved-plate nite strips for the analysis of shell
structures have been described by Dawe [25], Morris and
Dawe [26,27], Petyt and Fleischer [28] and Mohd and
Dawe [29].
In a series of papers [3037] the author and his co-
workers have described the buckling and vibration
analysis of complicated, composite laminated at-plate
structures using the S-a FSM in the contexts both of
SDPT and of CPT. The single-term approach is con-
sidered in Refs. [3032] and this has included adoption
of the complex-quantity philosophy to account for ap-
plied shear stress and anisotropic material when dealing
with long structures [31,32]. Multi-term approaches
for plate structures of nite length with diaphragm ends,
and again accounting for applied shear stress and an-
isotropy, are described in Refs. [33,34]. General de-
scriptions of the powerful and ecient FSM capabilities
are given in Refs. [3537]. Two computer programs
developed for the single-term complex algebra analysis
of long structures are designated BAVPAS (buckling
and vibration of plate assemblies using SDPT) and
BAVPAC (as for BAVPAS but using CPT). Two pro-
grams developed for the multi-term analysis of nite
D.J. Dawe / Composite Structures 57 (2002) 1136 13
length, diaphragm-supported structures are designated
BAVAMPAS (buckling and vibration analysis of multi-
term plate assemblies using SDPT) and BAVAMPAC
(as for BAVAMPAS but using CPT). All these pro-
grams incorporate the capability of using multi-level
substructuring procedures, including the use of super-
strips, as part of a highly ecient solution procedure. A
related multi-term analysis capability has been devel-
oped in similar fashion for the analysis of shell struc-
tures [38], using both thin and shear-deformable curved
nite strips. Returning consideration to shear deform-
able at-plate structures with diaphragm ends, it is
noted that Hinton et al. have described the calculation
of natural frequencies of isotropic structures [39,40] and
Laughlan has considered the buckling of composite
stiened panels [41,42], both using the multi-term ap-
proach.
Where the S-a FSM has been used in the multi-term
analysis of structures of nite length, the assumed
structure end conditions are almost invariably dia-
phragm supports and the longitudinal series terms used
in representing the displacements are sine and cosine
fractions. One exception to this is Ref. [16] wherein, in
the context of CPT, other end conditions are accom-
modated through the use of BernouilliEuler beam
functions in the longitudinal series. For the analysis of
shear deformable structures the use of Timoshenko
beam functions can be considered, but although such
functions have been used successfully in analysing single
plates [43,44], their use in practice for plate structures is
problematical. To provide increased versatility in ac-
commodating, amongst other things, a range of end
conditions, we turn attention to the spline FSM.
The spline FSM, incorporating the use of cubic B-
splines longitudinally, was rst introduced by Cheung
and Fan [45] in a static context and then used by these
authors in vibration analysis [46]. Lau and Hancock
have used a similar B-spline FSM (or B-s FSM) to study
the buckling of at plate structures subjected to applied
direct and shear stresses [47,48]. In these approaches the
material is homogeneous and the analysis is in the
context of CPT. Wang and Dawe [49] rst used B-spline
functions in the context of SDPT in studying the vi-
bration of anisotropic laminated plates and identied a
problem associated with the shear locking of thin plates
whose solution was described in Refs. [50,51]. The B-s
FSM has since been developed by these authors for the
analysis of the buckling and vibration of complicated
prismatic at plate structures [52,53] and curved-shell
structures [54,55]. Component plate (at or curved)
properties have been based on both classical, thin theory
and rst-order shear deformation theory. The associated
software package, PASSAS [54], incorporates advanced
analysis features such as multi-level substructuring and
superstrips. A further B-s FSM approach is reported by
Luo and Edlund [56] who considered the buckling of
isotropic at-plate trapezoidally corrugated panels in
the context of CPT.
The spline FSM approaches referred to in the pre-
ceeding paragraph all use equal spacing of spline knots
along the structure. Unequal spacing provides greater
versatility in dealing with, for instance, multi-span
structures and is considered in Section 3.
2.2. The curved plate nite strip
An individual curved plate nite strip, which is as-
sumed to form part of a prismatic structure, is shown in
Fig. 2(a). The nite strip has length A, uniform middle-
surface radius of curvature R, uniform thickness h and
curved breadth b at the middle surface. The local axes x,
y and z are surface ones, i.e. are axial, circumferential
and normal ones. The corresponding translational dis-
Fig. 2. A curved nite strip: (a) geometry and displacements, and (b) applied stress system.
placements at the middle surface are u, v and w. In
SDST analysis the quantities w
x
and w
y
shown in Fig.
2(a) are independent rotations of the middle-surface
normal along the x and y directions, respectively.
The nite strip may be subjected to an applied stress
system, comprising r
0
x
, r
0
y
and s
0
xy
as shown in Fig. 2(b),
leading to buckling, or it may be undergoing harmonic
motion whilst vibrating in a natural mode with circular
frequency p, or both these inuences may be present.
Each of the applied stresses will here be taken to have
uniform distribution throughout the strip, as illustrated,
but it is possible to accommodate non-uniform distri-
butions.
All displacement quantities (i.e. u, v, w, w
x
and w
y
in
the context of SDST, or just u, v and w in the context of
TST) are in fact perturbation quantities representing
changes that occur at the instant of buckling following
the application of the applied stress system at its critical
level, or representing changes that occur during vibra-
tion about a datum state which corresponds to some
prescribed value (including zero value) of the stress
system.
2.3. Basic SDST shell equations [38,54,55]
In rst-order SDST it is assumed that the displace-
ments at a general point, namely u, v and w, are ex-
pressed in terms of displacements u, v, and w at the
corresponding point on the middle surface and the in-
dependent rotations w
x
and w
y
, by the equations
uux; y; z ux; y zw
x
x; y
vvx; y; z vx; y zw
y
x; y
wwx; y; z wx; y
1
The linear expressions for the ve signicant strain
components of the enhanced KoiterSanders SDST,
which are used as the basis for the strain energy ex-
pression, are
e
x

ou
ox
z
ow
x
ox
; e
y

ov
oy

w
R
z
ow
y
oy
;
c
xy

ou
oy

ov
ox
z
ow
y
ox
_

ow
x
oy

1
2R
ov
ox
_

ou
oy
__
;
c
yz

ow
oy
w
y

v
R
; c
zx

ow
ox
w
x
2
Here e
x
and e
y
are in-surface direct strains, c
xy
is the in-
surface engineering shear strain, and c
yz
and c
zx
are the
through-thickness shear strains.
For an arbitrary lay-up the constitutive equations for
a laminate are
or F Le 3
Here N
x
; N
y
and N
xy
are the membrane direct and
shearing forces per unit length; M
x
; M
y
and M
xy
are the
bending and twisting moments per unit length; and Q
x
and Q
y
are the through-thickness shear forces per
unit length. The laminate stiness coecients are de-
ned as
A
ij
; B
ij
; D
ij

_
h=2
h=2
Q
ij
1; z; z
2
dz i; j 1; 2; 6
A
ij
k
i
k
j
_
h=2
h=2
Q
ij
dz i; j 4; 5
4
where Q
ij
for i; j 1, 2, 6 are in-surface reduced stiness
coecients and Q
ij
for i; j 4, 5 are through-thickness
shear stiness coecients. The k
i
k
j
are the prescribed
shear correction factors of the rst-order theory.
The strain energy density (i.e. energy per unit area of
the middle surface) of the curved nite strip can now be
expressed as
dU
1
2
e
T
Le 5
and is such that only rst derivatives of the ve funda-
mental displacement quantities occur in it: hence only
C
0
-type continuity is required for these quantities. This
linear strain energy will be a quadratic function of the
displacement quantities, of course.
N
x
N
y
N
xy
M
x
M
y
M
xy
Q
y
Q
x
_
_
_
A
11
A
12
A
22
A
16
A
26
A
66
Symmetric
B
11
B
12
B
16
D
11
B
12
B
22
B
26
D
12
D
22
B
16
B
26
B
66
D
16
D
26
D
66
0 0 0 0 0 0 A
44
0 0 0 0 0 0 A
45
A
55
_
_
_
_
ou=ox
ov=oy w=R
ou=oy ov=ox
ow
x
=ox
ow
y
=oy
ow
x
=oy ow
y
=ox ov=ox ou=oy =2R
ow=oy w
y
v=R
ow=ox w
x
_
_
_
_
The potential energy density of the applied stresses
r
0
x
, r
0
y
and s
0
xy
is
dV
g

1
2
h r
0
x
ou
ox
_ _
2
_ _

ov
ox
_ _
2
ow
ox
_ _
2
_
r
0
y
ou
oy
_ _
2
_

ov
oy
_

w
R
_
2
ow
oy
_

v
R
_
2
_
2s
0
xy
ou
ox
ou
oy
_

ov
ox
ov
oy
_

w
R
_
ow
ox
ow
oy
_

v
R
__
h
2
12
r
0
x
ow
x
ox
_ _
2
_ _

ow
y
ox
_ _
2
_
r
0
y
ow
x
oy
_ _
2
_

ow
y
oy
_ _
2
_
2s
0
xy
ow
x
ox
ow
x
oy
_

ow
y
ox
ow
y
oy
_
__
6
The kinetic energy density of the nite strip when vi-
brating with circular frequency p (and with the fun-
damental displacement quantities then regarded as
amplitudes of the motion) is
dT
1
2
p
2
qh u
2
_
v
2
w
2
h
2
12
w
2
x
_
w
2
y
_
_
7
where q is the material density (which is assumed here to
be uniform).
2.4. Displacement elds for SDST nite strips
2.4.1. Multi-term analysis of nite length structures
In analysing the buckling or vibrational behaviour of
actual, nite-length structures it is generally necessary to
employ a strip displacement eld of the multi-term type,
i.e. a eld in which each of the displacement reference
quantities is represented as a series of products of lon-
gitudinal functions and crosswise, or circumferential,
functions. With appropriate choice of the functions this
will allow the analysis of structures which may have a
range of dierent end conditions or may have aniso-
tropic material properties or which may be subjected to
applied shear stress. Here description is given of the
displacement elds for the multi-term S-a FSM and the
B-s FSM. These displacement elds dier radically in
the longitudinal representation of the displacement
quantities but the crosswise representation is the same in
both approaches and is based on the use of standard
shape functions of the type employed in nite element
analysis.
In the S-a FSM analysis of structures of nite length
the longitudinal representation of each of the ve fun-
damental quantities u, v, w, w
y
and w
x
is by a multi-term
series of analytical functions whose form is chosen so as
to meet the prescribed boundary conditions at the ends
of the nite strip as closely as possible. Thus the func-
tions have to be changed when the end conditions
change. When considering single at or curved plates
which are homogeneous or are balanced laminates it is
feasible to employ Timoshenko beam functions in the
longitudinal series [43,44] but when considering plate
or shell structures the use of these functions becomes
dicult for structures with general end conditions.
For structures with diaphragm ends, however, the beam
functions are, in fact, sine and cosine functions and it
is very useful and practical to use the S-a FSM to pre-
dict the behaviour of such structures. Then the as-
sumed strip displacement eld can be written in the form
[33]
Here
C
i
cos ipx=A; S
i
sin ipx=A; 9
the row matrix / is dened as
/y 1 y y
2
. . . y
n
10
and the A
1
etc. are generalised displacement coecients
corresponding to the ith terms of the longitudinal series.
The denition of /y allows for the generation of a
family of nite strip models with dierent degrees n of
crosswise polynomial representation. The nite strip
shown in Fig. 2(a), with four reference lines, corre-
sponds to cubic interpolation (n 3).
The displacement eld of Eq. (8) is written in terms of
generalised coecients but can be transformed to read
in terms of values of u, v, w, w
y
and w
x
at the reference
lines. In doing this, Lagrangian interpolation is assumed
since the problem is one of C
0
-type continuity.
For the case of diaphragm ends the boundary con-
ditions at x 0 and x A are that
v w w
y
N
x
M
x
0 11
and the chosen displacement eld should satisfy explic-
itly the kinematic conditions (v w w
y
0) whilst
u
v
w
w
y
w
x
_
_
_
r
i1
C
i
0 0 0 0
0 S
i
0 0 0
0 0 S
i
0 0
0 0 0 S
i
0
0 0 0 0 C
i
_
_
_
_
/ 0 0 0 0
0 / 0 0 0
0 0 / 0 0
0 0 0 / 0
0 0 0 0 /
_
_
_
_
A
1
A
2
:
:
A
5n5
_
_
_
_
i
8
allowing implicit satisfaction, via the variational proce-
dure, of the natural conditions (N
x
M
x
0). The
eld of Eq. (8) does satisfy all these conditions for or-
thotropic laminates but there is a diculty with the
natural conditions when the material is anisotropic,
leading to a degree of over-constraint, but the eect of
this is generally small for structures of moderate an-
isotropy.
In the B-s FSM the analytical longitudinal functions
of the S-a FSM are replaced with B-spline polynomial
functions. The longitudinal B-spline functions can cor-
respond to dierent orders of polynomial representation
and use has been made of linear, quadratic, cubic,
quartic and quintic B-splines which are designated as B
k
-
splines, with k 15. In employing the spline functions
the length A is divided into q spline sections which are
here taken to be of equal length d as shown in Fig. 3(a).
Corresponding to the q sections there are q 1 spline
knots within the length A, plus other knots outside each
end of the length A which are required to complete the
denition of a function and to prescribe appropriate
boundary conditions. The number of these latter knots
varies with the polynomial degree k but is two for k 3,
to which Fig. 3 refers. Fig. 3(b) shows a local B
3
-spline
function and Fig. 3(c) shows the combination of local
functions which contribute to the complete variation of
each of the displacement quantities, u etc., along the
strip. In algebraic terms we have
ux hd
u
; etc: 12
Here h is a row matrix which is called the modied B-
spline function basis. It contains all the local B-spline
functions, with some of these modied to take into ac-
count any prescribed boundary conditions at the spline
knots at x 0, A. The quantity d
u
is a column matrix
containing values of generalised knot coecients cor-
responding to u, and values of u (and perhaps ou=ox) at
the end knots.
A full description of one-dimensional spline func-
tions, with equally spaced knots, is included in Ref. [50]
wherein algebraic denitions of the local spline func-
tions of dierent polynomial degrees (k 15) are given.
A spline function of degree k has compact support over
k 1 spline sections and is C
k1
continuous.
The complete displacement eld for a B-spline nite
strip is [5255]
Here the quantity j denotes the number of a reference
line and n again is the order of polynomial representa-
tion in the y-direction. The N
j
N
j
y are Lagrangian
shape functions. (Eectively the crosswise representa-
tion is the same as in the S-a FSM.)
A particular and important point to note in Eq. (13)
is that in the longitudinal direction w
x
is represented by
B-splines of degree k 1 whilst the other displacement
quantities are represented by B-splines of degree k. This
corresponds to the so-called B
k;k1
-spline approach [50
55] and is introduced to avoid the detrimental eects of
shear-locking behaviour which would otherwise be
present when using a common value of k.
The above displacement eld of Eq. (13) is of general
applicability with regard to the satisfaction of end con-
ditions. Kinematic conditions can be applied directly
and explicitly whilst natural conditions are properly al-
lowed to be approached indirectly as a result of the
variational procedure. Also, the same basic spline rep-
resentation is used whatever the end conditions, with
modication made only local to structure ends when
accommodating dierent end conditions. It follows that
the B-s FSM is considerably more versatile than is the S-
a FSM, but often it will be less accurate in the particular
situation of diaphragm ends.
Fig. 3. Spline representation: (a) spline sections and knots, (b) local
spline function, and (c) combination of local spline functions.
u
v
w
w
y
w
x
_
_
_
n1
j1
N
j
0 0 0 0
0 N
j
0 0 0
0 0 N
j
0 0
0 0 0 N
j
0
0 0 0 0 N
j
_
_
_
_
h
k
0 0 0 0
0 h
k
0 0 0
0 0 h
k
0 0
0 0 0 h
k
0
0 0 0 0 h
k1
_
_
_
_
d
u
d
v
d
w
d
w
y
d
w
x
_
_
_
_
j
13
2.4.2. Single-term analysis of long structures
There are situations in which the mode shape of
buckling or vibration of a prismatic structure can rea-
sonably be assumed to be purely sinusoidal in the lon-
gitudinal direction. Then it is only necessary to consider
behaviour over one prescribed half-wavelength using a
single term to represent the variation of each reference
quantity in the longitudinal direction.
In circumstances where the ends of the structure are
supported by diaphragms, where the component plates
are made of orthotropic material and where no shear
stress is applied, the assumption of a sinusoidal mode in
the longitudinal direction is perfectly correct. Then the
nodal lines of a buckling or vibrational mode are
straight and parallel to the ends of the structure and the
analysis simply becomes a special case of the multi-term
S-a FSM of Section 2.4.1, with just the value i 1 used
in Eq. (8) and with ipx=A in Eq. (9) replaced by px=k
where k is the prescribed half-wavelength of the mode.
In circumstances where one or more of the compo-
nent plates is made of anisotropic material and/or where
applied shear stress is present, the nodal lines are gen-
erally curved and skewed across the structure. Within
the restriction of a single-term approach this behaviour
can be accommodated if the displacement reference
quantities are represented as complex quantities, in the
manner rst suggested by Wittrick [6]. When this is done
the conditions at the ends of the analysis half-wave-
length do not equate to conditions that could apply at
the ends of a practical structure of nite length. Thus the
single term, complex analysis is strictly correct only for
structures of innite length. However, it will be ap-
proximately correct in circumstances where the structure
is much longer than is the half-wavelength of the mode
of buckling or vibration, i.e. where the structure is
long and the mode is local in nature.
In the context of shear-deformation theory the com-
plex displacement eld is assumed to be [31,32]
Here j
1
p
, n px=k and Re( ) denotes the real part
of the quantity inside the parentheses. As before, A
1
etc.
are generalised coecients and /y is dened by
Eq. (10), and so the crosswise representation of dis-
placements is unchanged from that in the multi-term
analysis.
It is noted that the complex displacement eld of Eq.
(14) has been used in the nite strip analysis of at plate
structures but not as yet in the analysis of curved shell
structures.
2.5. SDST strip models, substructuring and solution
The properties of a particular, individual nite strip
can be established by using the appropriate displace-
ment eld of Section 2.4 in conjunction with the energy
expressions of Section 2.3, and by integrating over the
appropriate middle-surface area. The elastic stiness
matrix k, geometric stiness matrix k
g
and consistent
mass matrix m arise from the expressions for the den-
sities of strain energy, Eq. (5), potential energy of ap-
plied stresses, Eq. (6), and kinetic energy, Eq. (7),
respectively. Full algebraic details of the formulation of
k, k
g
and m in the various nite strip approaches are
given elsewhere and so only a few pertinent remarks will
be given here.
A family of nite strip models is available for each of
the types of approach described in Sections 2.4.1 and
2.4.2. The family is based upon the use of dierent de-
grees, n, of crosswise polynomial (Lagrangian) interpo-
lation. This order ranges from 1 to 5, corresponding to
linear to quintic interpolation.
In the multi-term approaches, for nite-length struc-
tures, the evaluation of the strip matrices requires inte-
gration to be carried out over the middle surface of a
strip running the whole length of the structure, of course,
i.e. for the limits 0 6x 6A and b=2 6y 6b=2. In the
single-term approach the integration is carried out over
one half-wavelength only, i.e. for 0 6x 6k and b=
2 6y 6b=2. In the longitudinal direction the integrations
are evaluated analytically in the S-a FSM approaches
and numerically, but fully, in the B-s FSM. In the
crosswise direction the integration is performed numer-
ically for all approaches, with full integration as standard
but with the option of reduced integration for the lower-
order strip models corresponding to n 1 or 2 or 3.
It is noted that in the single-term approach of Sec-
tion 2.4.2 the use of the complex displacement eld
of Eq. (14) results in k being complex Hermitian when
the material properties are anisotropic and in k
g
be-
ing complex Hermitian when applied shear stress is
present.
In modelling a plate or shell structure any component
plate can be represented by one or more nite strips and
u
v
w
w
y
w
x
_
_
_
_
Re e
jf
j 0 0 0 0
0 1 0 0 0
0 0 1 0 0
0 0 0 1 0
0 0 0 0 j
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
/ 0 0 0 0
0 / 0 0 0
0 0 / 0 0
0 0 0 / 0
0 0 0 0 /
_
_
_
_
A
1
A
2
:
:
A
5n5
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
14
the structure matrices K, K
g
and M could be assembled
using the normal direct stiness procedure. However, it
is much more ecient to make use of multi-level sub-
structuring techniques, across the structure, to reduce
drastically the number of eective degrees of freedom
and the solution time.
Substructuring is rst used at the level of each indi-
vidual nite strip to eliminate the freedoms at all inter-
nal reference lines. Then, at the level of a component
plate repetitive substructuring is used whilst creating an
assembly of 2
c
identical strips (where c 0; 1; 2 . . .) to
represent the component plate by a process of doubling
up [33]. The assembly of 2
c
strips is called a superstrip
of order c, or simply a SuperstripC. Typically we may
take c 5 so that each component plate is then mod-
elled with one Superstrip5 which is an assembly of 32
nite strips, but it is possible to use up to c 10 (1024
strips) before beginning to meet numerical problems.
Whatever the value of c, a superstrip ultimately has ef-
fective freedoms located only at the outside edges of the
component plate. There is no loss of accuracy involved
in the substructuring procedure, i.e. the performance of
a Superstrip5 is precisely the same as that of an assembly
of 32 individual strips, and superstrips of high order can
be created without any great time penalty as compared
to using just one individual strip.
A prismatic structure is modelled as an assembly of
superstrips and this gives eectively an exact crosswise
modelling of the structure if c P5, say. Before the as-
sembly of superstrips a rotation transformation is ap-
plied between local and global axes, and an eccentricity
transformation may be applied if deemed necessary (to
account for o-set connections) [33]. Beyond the sup-
erstrip level and following transformation to a global
conguration, higher levels of substructuring can be
invoked which involve progressive breakdown of the
structure into substructures which are assemblies of two
or more component plates [33,34]. The whole multi-level
substructuring technique makes it possible to solve ef-
ciently problems of very considerable complexity, with
hundreds of thousands of freedoms.
Eigenvalues, i.e. buckling stress levels or natural
frequencies of vibration, can be determined using an
extended Sturm sequence-bisection approach to the non-
linear eigenproblem, in the manner rst proposed by
Wittrick and Williams [12]. Procedures have also been
developed to extract the eigenvectors and then to plot
mode shapes using a three-dimensional graphics routine.
2.6. Reduction to TST Analysis
In thin shell analysis the Kirchho normalcy condi-
tion is invoked and it follows that
w
x

ow
ox
; w
y

v
R
ow
oy
15
This means, of course, that w
x
and w
y
are no longer
independent quantities and hence that u, v and w are the
only fundamental quantities of TST.
The basic equations of thin shell analysis are obtained
from those of the rst-order shear deformation analysis,
given in Section 2.3, by substituting for w
x
and w
y
, as
dened in Eq. (15), into Eqs. (1)(3), by removing the
expressions for Q
y
and Q
x
from the constitutive rela-
tionships of Eq. (3) and ignoring the second of Eq. (4),
and by removing the w
x
and w
y
contributions from Eqs.
(6) and (7). The SDST strip displacement elds of Eqs.
(8), (13) and (14) are reduced for TST analysis by re-
moving the expressions for w
y
and w
x
, of course. Also, in
TST analysis there is a requirement for C
1
-type conti-
nuity of w and hence the crosswise representation of w
has to be by Hermitian rather than Lagrangian inter-
polation.
In the context of TST, Fig. 2(a) can still represent an
individual nite strip of nite length. So far as crosswise
modelling is concerned, two strip models have been
developed for shell analysis. In a B-s FSM approach the
crosswise variations of u, v and w are each represented
by cubic polynomial interpolation of such a type that
the freedoms are located at the four reference lines
shown in Fig. 2(a) [54,55]. In a S-a FSM approach these
crosswise variations are taken to be quintic polynomials
[38] and again the freedoms can be located at the four
reference lines of Fig. 2(a). It is noted that in the S-a
FSM analysis of plate and shell structures in the context
of TST it is rather easier than it is in the context of
SDST to deal with end conditions that are other than
those of diaphragm supports. In the TST approach the
analytical longitudinal functions can be the well-known
BernoulliEuler beam functions which have been used
in buckling and vibration studies in reference [29].
In the complex, single-term S-a FSM for the analysis
of long structures, only at nite strips have been
considered in the context of classical theory and only
one type of strip model has been generated [32]. In this
model the crosswise representations of u, v and w are by
cubic polynomial functions (Lagrangian for u and v, and
Hermitian for w). As with the corresponding SDST
approach, k is complex Hermitian for anisotropic ma-
terial and k
g
is complex Hermitian when shear stress is
applied.
Beyond the level of the individual nite strip, the
procedures used in the context of TST to obtain solu-
tions to practical problems are broadly similar to those
described for SDST analysis in Section 2.5.
2.7. Selected applications
The literature contains many examples of the appli-
cation of the FSM to the prediction of buckling stresses
and natural frequencies of prismatic structures. Appli-
cations which are particularly pertinent to the analysis
described in Sections 2.22.6 are described in Refs. [25
27,2932,3438,5255] and many of these involve the
use of the programs BAVPAS, BAVPAC, BAVAM-
PAS, BAVAMPAC and PASSAS. Here, just three se-
lected applications are described.
2.7.1. Buckling of a long plate structure under axial stress
As an example of the analysis of a long plate
structure we consider the orthotropic stiened plate
whose cross-section is shown in Fig. 4(a) and which has
simply supported longitudinal edges. Each component
plate is of the same thickness h 0:05B and is a ve
layer 0/90/0/90/0 laminate in which the thickness of
each of the 0 plies is h=6 and that of each of the 90
plies is h=4. The material properties of all plies are
identical and are given by E
1
=E
2
30, G
12
=E
2
0:6,
G
13
=E
2
G
23
=E
2
0:5 and m
12
0:25.
The plate structure is subjected to uniform longitu-
dinal compressive stress r
0
x
and calculations of buckling
stress (with BAVPAS) are made for many dierent
values of prescribed half-wavelength k using the single-
term S-a FSM in the context of SDPT. In the crosswise
direction the modelling uses one quartic nite strip for
each component plate. For comparison purposes cal-
culations have also been made using VIPASA in the
context of CPT. A buckling factor K is dened as
K r
0
x
_ _
cr
B
2
h=p
2
D
11
where D
11
0:0599629E
1
h
3
The results for this application are presented graph-
ically in Fig. 4(b) with k plotted on a logarithmic scale.
It can be seen from Fig. 4(b) that, as expected, very
substantial dierences occur between the CPT and
SDPT predictions of K at short wavelengths but that the
dierences become negligible at long wavelengths. Three
kinds of buckling mode shape can be identied as k
varies. These are local, coupled and overall modes, and
typical mode shapes in these three categories are illus-
trated in Fig. 4(c): the quoted values of K
c
and K
s
refer
to buckling factors K calculated through the CPT and
SDPT approaches, respectively.
2.7.2. Buckling of a long shell panel under axial stress
Viswanathan and Tamekuni [9] have investigated the
buckling under uniform longitudinal compression of the
complicated isotropic thin shell panel shown in Fig. 5(a),
which has diaphragm ends. Their results are presented
Fig. 4. Buckling of stiened plate: (a) geometry, (b) plot of buckling factor versus half-wavelength, and (c) typical buckling modes.
graphically as a plot of buckling stress versus half-
wavelength of buckling, created by performing buckling
calculations at 20 discrete values of half-wavelength and
reproduced here in Fig. 5(b). The physical properties of
the material are that E 71:02 GN/m
2
and m 0:33.
FSM results for this problem could be generated
using the single-term semi-analytical approach (with
BAVPAC) but here the spline approach is used (with
PASSAS in the context of TST). The B
3
-spline FSM
results are also shown in Fig. 5(b) and correspond to a
model in which one Superstrip5 represents each com-
ponent plate and in which a series of dierent lengths of
the structure is considered, with q 4 for each length. It
is seen from Fig. 5 that there is very close comparison
between the spline FSM results and those of Ref. [9].
2.7.3. Buckling of NASA example 6 panel under com-
pressive and shear stress
The nite length corrugated panel under consider-
ation here is referred to as the NASA Example 6 panel
and the buckling of this panel was rst considered by
Stroud et al. [57] as part of a study of seven panels. Fig.
6(a) shows an overall view of the complete corrugated
panel whilst Fig. 6(b) gives geometrical details of one of
the six identical repeating elements. However, note that
the intermediate supports indicated in Fig. 6(a) are to be
ignored completely for the present application in this
section. (These intermediate supports are brought into
consideration in Section 3.2.)
The panel is simply supported all around its bound-
ary and is of square planform with a side length of
A 762 mm. The panel material is a laminated graph-
ite-epoxy composite with E
1
131 GN/m
2
, E
2
13
GN/m
2
, G
12
G
13
G
23
6:41 GN/m
2
and m
12
0:38.
Component plate ats are symmetrically laminated,
with thicknesses of 1.969 mm for plate ats 1, 3 and 5
(see Fig. 6(b) and 1.113 mm for plate ats 2 and 4).
For ats 1, 3 and 5 the lay-up is 45= 45= 45=
45=0
s
with ply thicknesses of 0.13917 mm except for
the 0 plies which have thicknesses of 0.42763 mm. For
ats 2 and 4 the lay-up is 45= 45= 45=45
s
and
all the ply thicknesses are 0.13917 mm. The laminates
are slightly anisotropic in bending.
The applied pre-buckling loadings dened by Stroud
et al. [57] are combinations (six in total but only the
cases of pure compression and pure shearing are con-
sidered here) of longitudinal compressive force N
0
x
and
shearing force N
0
xy
per unit width of panel. The applied
forces are distributed to give specic uniform stress
states in each of the component plates of the panel in the
manner described in Ref. [57] (and also recorded in Ref.
[34]). The most accurate procedure used by Stroud et al.
to predict buckling is a FEM approach in which a very
ne mesh of 1728, four-node, rectangular, hybrid CPT
elements is used.
The spline FSM has been used [52] in examining the
convergence with respect to q of solutions for the NASA
Example 6 plate-structure problem in the contexts of
both CPT and SDPT, though dierences between the
two approaches would be expected to be very small in
view of the thinness of the component plate ats. In
modelling the cross-section each plate at of all six re-
peating elements is represented by a cubic Superstrip5.
Further substructuring is used to reduce the eective
degrees of freedom to those at only seven reference lines,
these being the outside edges and the junctions between
the six repeating elements of the cross-section. It bears
mentioning that clearly these various levels of sub-
structuring reduce dramatically the number of eective
degrees of freedom of the problem. For the case of the
shear deformation theory analysis with q 8, the total
number of freedoms prior to any substructuring is in
Fig. 5. Buckling of NASA advanced structural panel: (a) cross-section, and (b) plot of buckling stress versus half-wavelength.
excess of 155,000, as compared to <350 after substruc-
turing (with no loss of accuracy in the calculated ei-
genvalues).
Numerical results for the predicted critical values of
force per unit length are presented in Table 1. In this
table the results generated by the equal-spline FSM (E-s
FSM) described in this section are given in results col-
umns (1), (2), (4), and (5). (The results given in columns
(3) and (6) refer to the use of a general-spline FSM
which will be discussed in Section 3.) It can be seen that
convergence of the E-s FSM results in this dicult
problem is orderly and appears very satisfactory for
both the CPT and SDPT analyses. Very close agreement
between the E-s FSM results, a set of S-a FSM results
(for r 7) and the FEM results is observed. There is
little dierence in this application between forecasts
based on the classical theory and on the shear defor-
mation theory.
3. Multi-span and stepped plate structures
3.1. Background
The presentation of the spline FSM in Section 2 has
been based on a B-spline representation in which the
spline knots are equally spaced longitudinally. It is clear
that the E-s FSM is versatile (more so than is the S-a
Fig. 6. The NASA Example 6 panel: (a) full geometry and loading, and (b) details of a repeating element. (Note that the indicated intermediate
supports are not present for the example of Section 2.7.)
Table 1
Compressive and shearing buckling loads of the original NASA Example 6 panel
Solution
method
N
0
x
cr
(kN/m) N
0
xy
cr
(kN/m)
E-s FSM SDPT (1) E-s FSM CPT (2) G-s FSM CPT (3) E-s FSM SDPT (4) E-s FSM CPT (5) G-s FSM CPT (6)
Spline FSM
q 2 264.57 264.66 276.66 240.16 242.15 255.26
q 3 261.28 261.36 226.64 228.79
q 4 260.77 260.87 268.44 219.25 221.47 235.73
q 5 260.68 260.77 216.55 218.81
q 6 260.66 260.75 264.30 215.69 217.97 228.09
q 7 260.65 260.75 215.39 217.67
q 8 260.65 260.75 260.76 215.25 217.55 218.54
q 10 260.74 217.51
S-a FSM
r 7 260.65 260.75 260.75 215.99 218.23 218.23
FEM [57] 261.26 261.26 218.56 218.56
FSM) but this versatility can be further increased if the
restriction to equally spaced knots is removed. The
specialist texts on spline usage by de Boor [58] and
Bartels et al. [59] describe spline representation using
non-uniform spacing of the spline knots. Here the
phraseology general spline is used to denote such
spline representation and the notation G-s FSM denotes
the FSM when general spline functions are used, and
eectively incorporates within it the E-s FSM. In the
area of structural analysis, non-uniform knot spacing
can clearly have its uses in dealing with practical situa-
tions involving intermediate supports at arbitrary loca-
tions, step changes in properties, localised areas of stress
concentration, etc.
In doctoral theses, Li [60] rst presented the G-s FSM
in the context of CPT whilst Wang [61] used general
splines in a RayleighRitz analysis in the context of
SDPT of the buckling and vibration of single plates.
Gutkowski et al. [62] studied the static CPT bending
analysis of single plates using the G-s FSM, with cubic
splines. Madasamy and Kalyanaraman [63] further
considered the CPT bending problem using the cubic
G-s FSM, but also studied in-plane behaviour in the
analysis of shear walls.
The G-s FSM has been developed recently in general
terms by Tan and Dawe [64,65] for the analysis of the
buckling and vibration of composite laminated plate
and shell structures, in the contexts of both TST and
SDST. The procedure is much the same as described in
Section 2 for the E-s FSM except, of course, that the
denitions of the local spline functions change to ac-
commodate arbitrary knot spacings. These denitions
are given in Refs. [64,65] and hence are not repeated
here. It is noted that for splines of degree k the functions
are still C
k1
continuous throughout their range.
A specic study [66] has been made of the use of the
G-s FSM in predicting the buckling stresses and natural
frequencies of single plates which have step changes of
properties (primarily of thickness) along their length.
The presence of a step change has consequences on the
appropriate level of continuity of displacement quanti-
ties at a step change. For example, in a TST bending
problem it is continuity of bending moment and shear
force that should apply at the step, rather than of second
and third derivatives of w, i.e. at the step w should
strictly be only C
1
continuous, and it follows that w will
be over-continuous for splines of degree k > 2. Whilst it
would be possible to introduce the concept of knot
multiplicity at a breakpoint (step change) [58,59], for
practical reasons the philosophy adopted in Ref. [66] is
to maintain the usual level of continuity of the spline
functions but to rene the knot spacings local to a step
change. This is not a rigorous solution but is a philos-
ophy that is soundly based theoretically [58,59] and has
been shown numerically to give accurate results when
using tight renement local to a step change [66].
3.2. Applications
3.2.1. Vibration of square plates having a thinned zone
[66]
The square plates considered here are of side length A
and have simply supported edges. The basic thickness is
h but a thinner square zone is present in the interior, as
shown in Fig. 7, of side length A=5 and thickness h=2.
Two types of construction are considered. In the rst
type the plate is made of homogenous, isotropic material
(m 0:3). In the second type the plate is an anisotropic
angle-ply laminate with equal-thickness plies for each of
which the material properties are dened by E
1
=E
2
14,
G
12
=E
2
0:533 and m
12
0:323. In the main the lami-
nate is of four-layer 45= 45
s
lay up but in the
thinner zone the outer two layers are removed. The
plates are thin, with h=A 0:004, and analysis is made
in the context of CPT.
In applying the G-s FSM, the nite strips run in the
x-direction with three cubic superstrips with (n 3,
k 3) used in the model, namely a Superstrip3 in the
region containing the thinned zone and a Superstrip4 in
each of the other two regions. For the isotropic plate,
comparative solutions have been generated using the
LUSAS FEM commercial program, with a ne mesh of
30 30 QSL8 elements. The G-s FSM and LUSAS
FEM results are recorded in Table 2 for the rst four
natural frequencies. In applying the G-s FSM, dierent
numbers of spline sections and dierent knot locations
are used: the knot locations are recorded beneath Table
2 and are such that tight knot renement is used local to
the two positions of step change in thickness. The pre-
sented G-s FSM results show that the manner of con-
vergence with increasing q is good and that there is very
Fig. 7. A square plate with a thinned zone.
close comparison with the FEM results for the isotropic
plate.
3.2.2. Buckling and vibration of NASA Example 6 panel
and modications
Here attention is returned to the corrugated NASA
Example 6 panel considered earlier in Section 2.7. The
original panel, as dened in Section 2.7, is considered
rst: it is recalled that results for this panel as generated
using the E-s FSM for pure compression and pure shear
loadings in the contexts of both CPT and SDPT, are
recorded in columns (1), (2), (4) and (5) of Table 1. Now
the G-s FSM is used, in the context of CPT, to solve the
same two problems with variable knot spacings such
that a knot renement is made local to the longitudinal
position x 0:782A. This would not be expected to have
any benecial eect as compared to using the E-s FSM
when dealing with the original panel, as here, but it is
pertinent to a situation considered in what follows in
which a step change of thickness will be introduced at
x 0:782A where A 762 mm (30 in.). The results of
the application of the G-s FSM are recorded in columns
(3) and (6) of Table 1 for q 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10, where the
knot spacings are dened by
q 2: 0; 23:46; 30A=30
q 4: 0; 22; 23:46; 25; 30A=30
q 6: 0; 10; 22; 23:46; 25; 27:5; 30A=30
q 8: 0; 8; 14; 19; 22; 23:46; 25; 27:5; 30A=30
q 10: 0; 4; 8; 12; 16; 19; 22; 23:46; 25; 27:5; 30A=30
The manner of convergence of the G-s FSM results is
good, but is a little slower than that of the E-s FSM, as
anticipated in this application where there is no specic
need for, or gain expected from, a renement of the knot
spacings in any region.
Now consideration is given to the analysis of the
panel but with the intermediate supports shown in Fig.
6(a) being applied to the outer two top-surface ats at
each side of the panel, and at the arbitrary location
x 431:8 mm. The crosswise FSM modelling of the
panel uses a Superstrip4 for each of component plates 1
and 5, and a Superstrip5 for each of component plates 2,
3 and 4. In the longitudinal direction the same number,
q, of equal spline sections is used in each of the two
spans dened by 0 < x < 431:8 mm and 431:8 < x < 762
mm. Calculated values of the rst six natural frequencies
(with q 1600 kg/m
3
) and of the buckling loads in pure
compression and pure shear are presented in Table 3.
Rapid and orderly convergence of the FSM results, with
increase in q, is evidenced and there is little dierence
between predictions based on q 2 and 5. This reects
the fact that the mode shapes of vibration and buckling,
as depicted in Fig. 8, have relatively simple shapes lon-
gitudinally.
Finally, attention is returned once more to the orig-
inal NASA Example 6 panel with no intermediate sup-
ports but now with the introduction of a step change in
thickness at x 0:782A. The step change is achieved by
removing all plies except the two central 0 plies from
component plates 1, 3 and 5 of all six repeating elements
of the panel cross-section, leaving these component
plates with thickness 0.85526 mm over the region 0 <
x < 0:782A. Numerical results obtained using the G-s
FSM for the rst six natural frequencies are recorded in
Table 4. In obtaining these results the crosswise FSM
modelling remains as described in the previous para-
Table 2
Frequencies of two square plates with a thinned zone: values of frequency factor X for the rst four modes. X p
A
2
h
q
E2
_
Solution method Isotropic plate Angle-ply laminate
Mode 1 Mode 2 Mode 3 Mode 4 Mode 1 Mode 2 Mode 3 Mode 4
G-s FSM
q 3 5.889 14.78 16.18 24.72 14.09 30.07 38.89 51.77
q 7 5.778 14.69 15.19 24.18 13.83 29.45 36.72 50.45
q 12 5.766 14.35 14.66 23.49 13.72 28.61 35.48 48.13
q 14 5.744 14.34 14.66 23.49 13.67 28.60 35.45 48.10
LUSAS FEM 5.768 14.34 14.66 23.50
Knot positions in the x-direction are as follows: q 3: 0; 80; 160; 400A=400, q 7: 0; 75; 80; 85; 155; 160; 165; 400A=400, q 12: 0; 40; 75; 80; 85;
120; 155; 160; 165; 220; 280; 340; 400A=400, q 14: 0; 40; 75; 80; 85; 120; 155; 160; 165; 200; 240; 280; 320; 360; 400A=400.
Table 3
Frequencies and buckling loads of modied two-span NASA Example 6 panels
q per span Natural freqencies (Hz) Buckling loads (kN/m)
Mode 1 Mode 2 Mode 3 Mode 4 Mode 5 Mode 6 N
0
x
cr
N
0
xy
cr
2 209.59 266.65 368.06 492.91 532.40 579.96 294.94 237.53
3 209.40 266.01 366.54 491.55 529.71 576.59 294.32 232.61
4 209.31 265.73 365.85 490.92 528.58 575.45 294.06 231.84
5 209.26 265.58 365.53 490.62 528.12 575.03 293.89 231.61
graph whilst in the longitudinal direction the chosen
knot positions are specied at the foot of the table. The
results demonstrate rapid convergence of frequency
values with increase in q.
4. Post-buckling of plate structures
4.1. Background
As well as in linear analysis of the sort discussed thus
far, the FSM can be very usefully employed in the non-
linear analysis of prismatic structures. In this section the
concern is with geometrically non-linear behaviour of
the large deection and post-buckling kinds, with em-
phasis on the latter.
In early geometrically non-linear analyses Graves-
Smith and co-workers [6769], Hancock [70], Bradford
and Hancock [71] and Cusens and Lengyel [72] have
used the S-a FSM in the context of CPT to predict the
response of homogeneous single plates and prismatic
plate structures, usually for post-buckling behavi-
our. Dawe et al. [7379] have used the S-a FSM in
considering the post-buckling behaviour of composite
Fig. 8. Mode shapes for the two-span NASA Example 6 panel: (a)(f) vibrational mode shapes 16, respectively, (g) compressive buckling mode
shape, and (h) shear buckling mode shape.
laminated structures in the contexts of both CPT and
the more rened SDPT. These analyses relate to single
plates [7377], to the post-local-buckling of plate struc-
tures [78], and to the post-overall-buckling of dia-
phragm-supported plate structures [79].
The equal-spline FSM has been used in the elastic
post-buckling analysis of shells by Zhu and Cheung
[80]. The geometrically non-linear analysis of at-plate
structures using the spline FSM has been developed by
Hancock et al. [48] and Kwon and Hancock [81]. These
approaches use cubic B
3
splines and are limited to ho-
mogeneous material and thin geometry. The B-s FSM
analysis of the post-buckling behaviour of single com-
posite laminated rectangular plates has been described
by Dawe and Wang in the context of CPT [82] and of
SDPT [83]. The same authors have extended these works
to embrace the analysis of complicated prismatic plate
structures of composite laminated construction (in-
cluding also shell panels when treated as faceted struc-
tures) again in the contexts of both plate theories [84].
4.2. Some theoretical details
The geometric non-linearity is introduced in the
context of a total Lagrangian approach by way of a
von Karman-type modication to the linear strain
displacement equations recorded earlier in Eq. (2).
Restricting attention to at geometry with no imper-
fections, and in the context of SDPT, the in-plane non-
linear strains are assumed to be given by [79,84]
e
x

ou
ox
z
ow
x
ox

1
2
ow
ox
_ _
2
1
2
ov
ox
_ _
2
e
y

ov
oy
z
ow
y
oy

1
2
ow
oy
_ _
2
1
2
ov
oy
_ _
2
c
xy

ou
oy

ov
ox
z
ow
x
oy
_

ow
y
ox
_
ow
ox
ow
oy

ov
ox
ov
oy
16
whilst the expressions for the through-thickness shear
strains c
yz
and c
zx
remain linear, as recorded in Eq. (2). It
is noted that non-linear contributions in the crosswise
displacement v are present in the expressions for e
x
, e
y
and c
xy
so as to allow consideration of plate structure
problems that exhibit post-overall-buckling response as
well as those that exhibit post-local-buckling response.
(On the other hand, non-linear terms in the longitudinal
displacement u are quite insignicant and are omitted.)
As a consequence of the enhancement of the strain
displacement equations, as compared to the linear
equations, the strain energy density dU can be expressed
as a summation of quadratic (dU
2
), cubic (dU
3
) and
quartic (dU
4
) functions of the displacement-type quan-
tities and their derivatives with respect to x and y. Thus
dU dU
2
dU
3
dU
4
17
The strip displacement eld in non-linear analysis
broadly has the form of Eq. (8) for the S-a FSM or of
Eq. (13) for the spline FSM, but possibly with some
additions u
p
and v
p
to the expressions for u and v, re-
spectively, depending upon the type of problem being
considered. As a particular case in point, consider a
prismatic plate structure which is subjected to a pro-
gressive uniform end-shortening strain e, applied to the
complete end cross-sections or applied in a particular
horizontal plane, such as in the plane of the main plate
of a stiened structure. The additions u
p
and v
p
are
applied only to any nite strip to which the shortening
strain e is applied, and have the form
u
p
e A=2 x; v
p
eby 18
This represents explicitly a progressive uniform end
shortening of a strip, with the u
p
term, and a possible
Poisson expansion, through the v
p
term, in a simple pre-
buckled state. If the strip ends are allowed free in-plane
lateral expansion, in what is referred to as a type A
problem [74], then b m, the Poissons ratio, for iso-
tropic material, or b A
12
=A
22
for balanced orthotropic
material. However, the presence of the v
p
term is not
essential or even particularly advantageous for the ma-
jority of type A problems involving structures (as dis-
tinct from single plates). If the strip ends are completely
prevented from expanding laterally, in what is referred
to as a type B problem [74], then b 0 anyway.
Detailed description of the nature of the non-linear
analysis is available elsewhere [7479], [8284] and is not
repeated here. Ultimately a set of structure equations
is obtained of the form
Table 4
Frequencies of modied NASA Example 6 panel with thickness change
q Natural frequencies (Hz)
Mode 1 Mode 2 Mode 3 Mode 4 Mode 5 Mode 6
2 226.95 244.11 273.90 317.58 354.36 358.40
4 221.89 238.69 267.82 310.34 343.45 347.53
6 218.36 234.94 263.66 305.53 337.07 341.00
8 218.28 234.86 263.58 305.42 336.84 340.76
10 218.22 234.80 263.51 305.35 336.72 340.64
Knot positions in the x-direction are as follows: q 2: 0; 23:46; 30A=30, q 4: 0; 22:5; 23:46; 24:5; 30A=30, q 6: 0; 10; 19; 22:5; 23:46; 24:5;
30A=30, q 8: 0; 8; 16; 19; 22:5; 23:46; 24:5; 27; 30A=30, q 10: 0; 4; 8; 12; 16; 19; 22:5; 23:46; 24:5; 27; 30A=30.
eV K
_
eK
1
2
K
1

1
3
K
2
_
d 0 19
where V is a column matrix of constants whilst K, K
, K
1
and K
2
are square symmetric stiness matrices whose
individual entries are constants for K and K
, and are
linear and quadratic functions of the freedoms for K
1
and K
2
, respectively. The K and K
are associated with

the quadratic strain energy density dU
2
and K
1
and K
2
are associated with the cubic and quartic energy densi-
ties dU
3
and dU
4
, respectively. The equations are solved
for the structure freedoms

dd using the NewtonRaphson
iterative method in which use is made of the tangent
matrix K
T
, dened as
K
T
K eK
K
1
K
2
20
4.3. Applications
4.3.1. Six-blade, at stiened panel
The panel considered here has the cross-section
shown in Fig. 9(a) and its length is A 762 mm so that
the panel is square in plan. It is one of the seven panels
whose buckling was considered by Stroud et al. [57]: it is
referred to as the NASA Example 4 panel. It happens
that the panel is made of aluminium, with E 72:4 GN/
m
2
and m 0:32, rather than being of laminated con-
struction. The analysis is conducted in Ref. [57] and here
in the context of CPT.
In their bifurcational buckling analysis Stroud et al.
assumed that the panel ends are diaphragm supported
(with v w 0) and the longitudinal edges are simply
supported (w 0). Of the loading cases considered [57]
the one of concern here is that of pure compression
based on the assumption of uniform longitudinal pre-
buckling strain. The buckling of this panel has also been
considered by Peshkam and Dawe [34] using the S-a
FSM. For the pure compression case the bifurcational
buckling load is calculated as 39.47 kN using the S-a
FSM, whereas the calculated FEM value from Ref. [57]
is just 0.24% higher. The corresponding buckled mode
shape is a local one, with six longitudinal half-waves.
The nite strip analysis of the post-buckling behav-
iour of the NASA Example 4 panel under progressive
end shortening has been conducted in two ways, using
the S-a-FSM in a simplied local analysis [78] and later
using the spline FSM in a general analysis [84]. In the
earlier S-a FSM approach, assumptions are made that
allow the analysis to be conducted over only a specied
half-wavelength of buckling, rather than over the whole
panel length. Since it was found that the bifurcational
buckling load of the panel corresponding to seven lon-
gitudinal half-waves is close to that corresponding to six
half-waves, two separate non-linear analyses have been
performed for these two distinct numbers of half-waves
[78]. In the later E-s FSM approach the full length of the
panel is considered, with no pre-conception of any likely
longitudinal form in the buckling or post-buckling re-
sponse [84]. The panel is assumed to be subjected to
progressive uniform end shortening over the whole
cross-section, and the prescribed end conditions, in
terms of local displacements, are that at x 0, A, we
have u Ae=2 and w 0, v 6 0, that is the component
plates are simply supported for out-of-plane behaviour
and free to expand in their planes. The longitudinal
edges of the main plate are simply supported, that is
w 0, and are free to move in plane. Both the S-a-FSM
and the spline FSM models of the panel take note of the
symmetry of the structure and the response about the
longitudinal centre line and use nine strips across half
the panel width, with one strip for each of the three
stieners and six strips of equal width for half of the
main plate (with u and v interpolated quadratically and
w cubically across a strip). For the spline FSM model
(with k 3), 16 spline sections are used along the panel
length.
The general response of the panel as predicted by the
local S-a FSM (with the two prescribed values of half-
wavelength) and by the spline FSM is shown in Fig. 9(b)
in the form of plots of N
av
(the average longitudinal
force) versus e (the end-shortening strain). Close com-
parison between the two approaches is revealed. The
local S-a FSM approach shows that buckling and initial
post-buckling corresponds to six longitudinal half-waves
but that at a fairly early stage of post-buckling there is a
change to seven half-waves. The spline FSM approach
shows no bifurcational buckling as such, but rather a
continuous progressive change throughout the defor-
mation process, although the knee of the curve in Fig.
9(b) is quite sharp and occurs at a force which is close to
the bifurcational buckling force. The progressive build
up of deformation in a symmetric half of the panel, as
predicted by the spline FSM, is shown for six particular
values of shortening strain in Fig. 9(c). Initially there is
some small deformation of an overall type, followed by
local deformation with six longitudinal half-waves and
then with seven half-waves at higher values of shorten-
ing strain.
4.3.2. Curved panel with edge stieners
Some details of the physical testing of a composite
laminated curved panel considered here have been sup-
plied by DERA Farnborough by private communica-
tion. The cross-section of the edge-stiened panel is
shown in Fig. 10(a) and its length is 460 mm. The ply
thickness is 0.125 mm and the 32-ply lay up is
of 45= 45=0=90= 45=45=0=0=45= 45=0=
0= 45=45=90=90
s
balanced construction. The ply
material properties are E
1
135 GN/m
2
, E
2
9:2 GN/
m
2
, G
12
G
13
G
23
5:4 GN/m
2
and m
12
0:28. In the
test the panel was subjected to a progressive uniform
end shortening up to beyond the buckling level. The
longitudinal edges were completely free and the curved
ends were notionally fully clamped. The only test in-
formation available is that the buckling load was esti-
mated at 880 kN and that the post-buckled shape was
photographed as shown in Fig. 10(b).
The B-s FSM, in the context of shear deformation
theory, has been applied rst to predicting the bifurca-
Fig. 9. The six-blade stiened panel: (a) panel cross-section, (b) plot of average longitudinal force versus applied shortening strain, and (c) deformed
shapes of one half of the panel at six applied strain levels.
Fig. 10. The curved panel with edge stieners: (a) panel cross-section, (b) experimental deformed shape, (c) plot of average longitudinal force versus
applied shortening strain, and (d) calculated deformed shapes on pp, sp1 and sp2.
tional buckling of the panel, under uniform longitudinal
compressive stress, using PASSAS with 80 nite strips
and q 16. For fully clamped ends the calculated lowest
buckling load is 971 kN and it is found that numerous
other buckling modes occur in close proximity to this
load. Changing the end conditions to diaphragm sup-
ports reduces the lowest predicted buckling load to 795
kN and thus the test value of load lies about midway
between the FSM predictions based on clamped ends
and on diaphragm ends. When considering non-linear
response to progressive uniform end shortening the
FSM model is a faceted one of 12 at strips (eight in the
curved portion), with q 6. The predicted general re-
sponse of the panel (N
av
versus e) is shown in Fig. 10(c)
and reveals the stable parts of a primary path (pp) and
two secondary paths (sp1 and sp2). The deformed
shapes of the panel in these paths are shown in Fig.
10(d) and it can be seen that the shape for the predicted
lowest equilibrium path (sp2) is very similar to that
shown for the test panel in Fig. 10(b).
5. Thermal loading eects
Thermal loading is sometimes an important feature in
analysing the behaviour of structures, particularly in the
realm of aerospace, whether acting on its own or in
conjunction with applied mechanical loading. The FSM
procedures described above clearly can be extended to
include thermal eects but developments in this area
seem to have been limited thus far to thermal and
thermo-mechanical buckling and post-buckling of single
rectangular at plates.
The thermal buckling of shear deformable composite
laminated plates by the E-s FSM is described recently by
Dawe and Ge [85] wherein the analysis takes place in
two distinct phases. In the rst phase an in-plane ther-
mal stress analysis is conducted for the pre-buckling
stage in which the plate is assumed to remain at under
the action of a non-uniform temperature eld (although
the temperature does not vary through the thickness). The
constitutive equations for in-plane behaviour are mod-
ied to incorporate a temperature increase Tx; y and
are:
N
x
N
y
N
xy
_
_
_
A
11
A
12
A
16
A
12
A
22
A
26
A
16
A
26
A
66
_
_
_
_
ou=ox
ov=oy
ou=oy ov=ox
_
_
_
_
_
_
_
T
a
x
a
y
2a
xy
_
_
_
_
_
_
_ 21
where a
x
, a
y
and a
xy
are thermal expansion coecients.
The pre-buckling u and v displacements are represented
in the same way as are u and v in Eq. (13). The solution
of the plane stress problem yields the distributions of the
pre-buckling stresses r
0
x
, r
0
y
, s
0
xy
in terms of a datum value
of temperature, throughout the nite strips making up
the plate. In the second phase this stress distribution is
taken forward to an eigenvalue buckling analysis in
much the same way as described in Section 2, using the
displacement eld of Eq. (13) (where now the displace-
ments are perturbations) and a somewhat less general
form of the constitutive equations recorded in Eq. (3)
(with the B
12
coecients absent). It is noted that the
superstrip approach cannot be used since, in general, the
pre-buckling stress distribution is non-uniform.
The analysis of the buckling of single rectangular
laminates under the action of combined thermal and
mechanical loading, i.e. thermo-mechanical loading, has
also been considered using the spline FSM in the context
of SDPT [86,87]. Furthermore the extension to post-
buckling behaviour in the presence of temperature
change is described by Ge [86].
As one example of thermal buckling we consider the
buckling of symmetric ve-layer h= h= h= h= h
angle-ply square laminates when subjected to uniform
temperature rise. This problem was considered by Pra-
bhu and Dhanaraj [88] who generated results in graph-
ical form based on a FEM approach in the context
of SDPT, using a 6 6 mesh of nine-node Lagran-
gian isoparametric elements. The material properties are
specied as
E
1
=E
2
40; G
12
=E
2
G
13
=E
2
0:6; G
23
=E
2
0:5;
m
12
0:25; a
1
=a
0
0:02;
a
2
=a
0
22:5; E
2
10
5
; a
0
10
6
:
For a laminate with S2 boundary conditions on all
sides (i.e. v w w
y
0 at edges x 0, A for instance)
the pre-buckling stress distribution is highly non-uni-
form: Fig. 11 shows this in the form of contour plots of
N
0
x
and N
0
xy
when using the spline FSM (with n 3,
k 3) for a thin square plate with A B 200,
A=h 100, h 45. (The plot for N
0
y
is virtually iden-
tical to that for N
0
x
).
Numerical results for the B-s FSM calculation of
critical temperature rise T
cr
are recorded in Table 5
wherein NS is the number of nite strips used. No
comparative numerical solution is available but the
manner of convergence of the spline FSM results ap-
pears to be very satisfactory despite the complexity of
the pre-buckling stress distribution. Graphical compar-
ison of the spline FSM results with the FEM results of
Ref. [88] is made in Fig. 12 for the full range of bre
angles, h 090, and for both thin (A=h 100) and
thick (A=h) geometries, and two sets of boundary con-
ditions, namely S2 and C1 (fully clamped). It is seen that
there is generally close comparison between the predic-
tions of the two approaches, except perhaps for the
S2-supported thick laminate with h 0 and h 90.
6. Dynamic response
Another type of structural response which can be of
importance for composite laminated structures is tran-
sient response to dynamic loading. Again, only a very
limited body of work is available to date in this subject
area when considering the application of the FSM. For
homogeneous isotropic material, work has been con-
ducted on the use of the S-a FSM in predicting the dy-
namic response of stiened plate structures to pressure
loading, by Khalil et al. [89] and by Houlston [90]. Non-
linear behaviour is included in these studies which are
conducted in the context of CPT. In considering single
rectangular laminates Chen and Dawe [91] have con-
sidered the linear transient response to normal loading
through the use of the S-a FSM in the context of SDPT
and in conjunction with a modal superposition proce-
dure. Later, the spline FSM has been used in a similar
way [92]. These approaches are limited to small-deec-
tion behaviour but more recently the S-a FSM approach
has been upgraded to the realm of geometrically non-
linear analysis [93], with the non-linearity being intro-
duced in the straindisplacement equation in the manner
of the von Karman assumptions, in similar fashion to
that described in Section 4. Solution in the time domain
is made using the implicit Newmark method and at any
time step convergence towards the equilibrium state is
Fig. 11. Pre-buckling stress resultant distributions at uniform temperature rise of T 100 for a square ve-layer symmetric angle-ply plate: (a)
10
6
N
0
x
, and (b) 10
6
N
0
xy
.
Table 5
Critical temperatures of a ve-layer, angle-ply, thin, square laminate
with S2 boundary, by spline FSM
NS 8 q 8
q T
cr
NS T
cr
2 389.8 2 387.9
4 385.8 4 384.4
6 384.0 6 383.7
8 383.5 8 383.5
10 383.3 10 383.4
Fig. 12. Variation of critical temperature with bre angle for square, symmetric angle-ply (h 45) plates with C1 and S2 edges: (a) A=h 100, and
(b) A=h 10.
achieved using the NewtonRaphson iteration tech-
nique. No further analysis details will be given here, but
a typical application from Ref. [93] is now presented.
An orthotropic square plate of dimensions A B
250 mm and h 5 mm is considered. The plate is of
0=90=90=0 construction, with the plies being of equal
thickness. The material property set is E
1
525 GN/
mm
2
, E
2
21 GN/mm
2
, G
12
G
13
G
23
10:5 GN/
mm
2
, m
12
0:25, q 800 kg/m
3
.
The plate edges are simply supported for out-of-plane
behaviour, whilst in the plane of the plate normal
movement of an edge is allowed but tangential move-
ment is prevented. A suddenly applied step loading acts
with uniform intensity 1 N/mm
2
over the plate surface.
In applying the SDPT S-a FSM to predict the transient
response, four cubic (n 3) strips are used to model the
plate and four longitudinal series terms are used in
representing each displacement-type quantity. The FSM
analysis has been conducted in the realms both of linear
theory and of geometrically non-linear theory (using a
time step of 10 ls). For comparison purposes, results
have been generated using LUSAS, with a 6 6 mesh of
QSL8 elements in the geometrically non-linear realm.
The results for this application are presented graphically
in Fig. 13 in the form of plots of dimensionless central
deection ww
c
w
c
=h and dimensionless central surface
stress rr
yc
525r
yc
=E
1
against time. It is clear that the
predictions of the non-linear S-a FSM are broadly ver-
ied by comparison with the FEM predictions. The
linear FSM predictions are markedly dierent from the
non-linear predictions at the level of loading considered
here.
7. Buckling and vibration of sandwich plate structures
Because of their advantageous stiness-to-weight ra-
tios, sandwich plates have been used as load-carrying
Fig. 13. Dynamic response of a four-layer, antisymmetric angle-ply plate to step pressure of 1 N/mm
2
: (a) central deection versus time, and
(b) central stress versus time.
structures over many years, especially in the realms of
aeronautical and marine engineering. The most usual
sandwich construction consists of a relatively thick core
of low-density material which separates top and bottom
faceplates which are relatively thin but sti. The mate-
rials used over the years have been numerous and varied
but interest in sandwich construction has increased in
quite recent times with the introduction of new materials
for use in the core (e.g. solid foams) and in the faceplates
(e.g. bre reinforced composite laminated material).
It appears that only a little work has been conducted
on the analysis of the buckling and vibration of sand-
wich plate structures when using the FSM. Chan and
Cheung [94] used the S-a FSM in considering the static
and dynamic behaviour of multi-layer orthotropic sand-
wich plates. This work was extended to include buckling
analysis by Chan and Foo [95]. Later Chong et al. [96]
used a combined nite prism (for the core) and nite
strip (for the faceplates) approach to the free vibration
problem. Recently Dawe and Yuan have used the B-s
FSM in studying the buckling [97,98] and free vibration
[99] of single sandwich plates with laminated faceplates.
Some extensions to sandwich plate structures are de-
scribed by Yuan [100].
The analysis of the structural behaviour of sandwich
plates is naturally more complicated than is that of
homogeneous plates or compact laminated plates, be-
cause of the increased variability of the through-thick-
ness properties and the potential increase in complexity
of through-thickness behaviour, as met in particular in
buckling applications where local modes, such as face-
plate wrinkling, can occur as well as overall modes. For
good accuracy the analysis of conventional sandwich
plates generally requires the use of a three-zone plate
theory, with distinct but inter-related assumptions made
for the variation of displacement quantities through the
thickness of each of the two faceplates and of the core.
In Refs. [97100] the core is treated as a three-di-
mensional body, with quadratic variation of in-plane
displacements and linear variation of out-of-plane dis-
placement through its depth. In two variants, each of the
faceplates is modelled in eect in the context of SDPT or
in the context of CPT. For SDPT faceplates Fig. 14
shows a view of a partial cross-section of a sandwich
plate in the xz plane, with co-ordinates and displace-
ment quantities indicated [97], and obviously a similar
view could be drawn in the yz plane. At a general point
in the core the displacements uu
c
, vv
c
and ww
c
are dened as
uu
c
u
c

z
c
t
c
u
2
u
1

z
c
2t
c
t
1
w
x1
t
2
w
x2
z
2
c
t
2
c
2u
1
2u
2
4u
c
t
1
w
x1
t
2
w
x2
vv
c
v
c

z
c
t
c
v
2
v
1

z
c
2t
c
t
1
w
y1
_
t
2
w
y2
_
z
2
c
t
2
c
2v
1
_
2v
2
4v
c
t
1
w
y1
t
2
w
y2
_
ww
c

w
1
w
2
2

z
c
t
c
w
2
w
1
22
For a faceplate f, where f 1 or 2, the displacements at
a general point are given by
uu
f
u
f
z
f
w
xf
; vv
f
v
f
z
f
w
yf
;
ww
f
w
f
; f 1; 2 23
In the context of SDPT faceplates the through-
thickness displacement variations are seen to involve a
total of 12 fundamental displacement quantities (as
against the ve involved in the SDPT analysis of com-
pact laminates, as in Section 2). In the context of CPT
Fig. 14. Sandwich plate displacements in the xz plane.
faceplates, simplication of the above displacement ex-
pressions exists [97,99,100] which involve a total of eight
fundamental displacement quantities (as against the
three involved in the CPT analysis of compact lami-
nates). The reader is referred to Refs. [97,99] for all
further details of the B-spline analyses of the buckling
and free vibration of sandwich plates.
Many applications of the FSM capabilities are
described in Refs. [98] and [99] for buckling and free
vibration, respectively. The buckling problem is of par-
ticular interest because of the possibility of highly loca-
lised modes as well as overall modes. Here, two related
buckling applications, exhibiting localised wrinkling
behaviour, are presented [98].
The sandwich plates considered are simply supported
and square, with A B 228 mm and their core is 25
mm thick with elastic properties dened as E 109 N/
mm
2
, G
xz
26:6 N/mm
2
and G
yz
15:5 N/mm
2
. These
details are taken from a study by Pearce and Webber
[101]. The core has exibility in the direction normal to
the faceplates but is assumed to have zero stiness in its
plane [101]. The two sandwich plates dier in their
faceplates. For plate I each of the faceplates is of two-
layer 90=0 construction with each layer being of
thickness 0.125 mm; for plate II each of the faceplates is
of three-layer 45=0=45 construction with the 45
layers each being 0.125 mm thick and the 0 layer being
0.25 mm thick. The layer properties are that E
1
142
GN/m
2
, E
2
9:8 GN/m
2
, G
12
G
13
G
23
4:3 GN/m
2
and m
12
0:34. The applied in-plane loading is uniform
uniaxial compressive stress on the faceplates. The pre-
dictions of the critical values of this stress by Pearce and
Webber are based on the analysis of one half-wave of
the buckled mode, on the assumption of orthotropic
material properties. This assumption is satisfactory for
plate I but would not be expected to be suitable for plate
II since then the faceplates are heavily anistropic,
through the presence of the D
16
and D
26
coecients,
leading to skewing of the buckled mode shape.
In applying the B-s FSM to these applications it is
assumed that the applied uniaxial stress acts in the y-
direction. Each of the complete plates is modelled with
one superstrip running along the x-direction whose
power c is varied in a convergence study, up to c 8
(256 strips). Quintic splines (k 5) are used and the
number of equal spline sections used is q 8 for plate I
and q 30 for plate II (where the x-direction behaviour
is more complicated). The results of the convergence
studies are recorded in Table 6 in the contexts of both
CPT and SDPT faceplates. For both plates it is neces-
sary to use many strips to achieve convergence because
of the extreme complexity of the highly localised buck-
led mode shapes, as shown in Fig. 15. Some small eect
of the through-thickness shear deformation of the
faceplates is apparent from the dierences in Table 6
between the sets of results corresponding to CPT and
SDPT faceplates. For the orthotropic plate I there is
a very close comparison of the FSM result with that
of Ref. [101], whilst for the anisotropic plate II the
Table 6
Critical direct loads per unit length N
0
y
cr
(N/mm) for uniaxially loa-
ded, simply supported, square sandwich plates I and II
Solution
method
Plate I Plate II
CPT
faceplates
SDPT
faceplates
CPT
faceplates
SDPT
faceplates
B-s FSM
c 1 674.0 674.0 713.2 713.1
c 2 673.9 673.9 707.5 707.3
c 3 343.4 343.4 424.4 421.6
c 4 109.4 109.0 292.8 277.1
c 5 87.42 85.36 240.7 232.2
c 6 78.23 76.92 232.9 228.0
c 7 77.24 76.19 232.2 227.8
c 8 77.14 76.16 232.2 227.8
Single half-
wave analysis
[101]
77 285
Fig. 15. Buckled mode shapes of two sandwich plates: (a) 90/0 faceplates, and (b) 45/0/45 faceplates.
prediction of Ref. [101] is seen to be considerably
oversti as compared to the FSM prediction.
8. Conclusions
A review has been presented of aspects of the use of
the FSM in predicting a number of types of linear and
non-linear behavioural response of composite lami-
nated, prismatic plate and shell structures. The use of
the two main variants of the method, i.e. the semi-ana-
lytical and spline variants has been discussed. These
variants are complementary to one another: the semi-
analytical approach is capable of greater accuracy and
eciency in some relatively simple situations, including
particularly in the single-term analysis of long struc-
tures, whilst the spline approach is the more versatile,
especially when employing variable knot spacing. The
use of dierent plate/shell theories has been described,
including the rst-order shear deformation theory for
compact laminates and a three-zone theory for sandwich
plate structures.
For the analysis of prismatic structures the FSM has
attractive qualities relative to other approaches. As an
initial design tool it compares favourably with the gen-
eral FEM from considerations of computational econ-
omy and ease of modelling. Its advantage is particularly
marked in the solution of the eigenvalue problems of
determining buckling stresses and natural frequencies of
vibration of complicated structures. In this sphere the
use of a solution procedure which incorporates multi-
level substructuring, including the use of superstrips,
provides a highly ecient analysis capability. The ex-
amples of applications presented herein hopefully show
something of the scope and eciency of the FSM.
There is good reason to expect continued develop-
ment of the FSM in the future. More work needs to be
conducted in the areas of non-linear dynamic response
and thermomechanical behaviour, for plate and shell
structures. There is scope for extending the study of the
buckling and vibration of single sandwich plates to
embrace plate and shell structures, and further to em-
brace non-linear behaviour. With the use of general
spline functions, consideration could be given to the
presence of supporting structures at arbitrary locations
along a structure in buckling and vibration applications.
Also, other types of behavioural response could usefully
be considered using the method, such as dynamic
buckling behaviour [102].
References
[1] Cheung YK. The nite strip method in the analysis of elastic
plates with two opposite simply supported ends. Proc Inst Civil
Engrs 1968;40:17.
[2] Cheung YK. Finite strip method in structural analysis. Oxford:
Pergamon; 1976.
[3] Loo YC, Cusens AC. The nite strip method in bridge engineer-
ing. Slough: Viewpoint Publications, Cement and Concrete
Association; 1978.
[4] Cheung YK, Tham LG. The nite strip method. USA: CRC
Press; 1998.
[5] Wittrick WH. A unied approach to the initial buckling of
stiened panels in compression. Aero Quart 1968;12:26583.
[6] Wittrick WH. General sinusoidal stiness matrices for buckling
and vibration analysis of thin at-walled structures. Int J Mech
Sci 1968;10:94666.
[7] Smith CS. Bending, buckling and vibration of orthotropic plate-
beam structures. J Ship Res 1968;12:24968.
[8] Dawe DJ. Finite strip buckling and postbuckling analysis. In:
Turvey GJ, Marshall IH, editors. Buckling and postbuckling of
composite plates. London: Chapman and Hall; 1995. p. 10853.
[9] Viswanathan AV, Tamekuni M. Elastic buckling analysis for
composite stiened panels and other structures subjected to
biaxial inplane loads. NASA CR-2216, 1973.
[10] Viswanathan AV, Tamekuni M, Baker CC. Elastic stability of
laminated at and curved, long rectangular plates subjected to
combined in-plane loads. NASA CR-2330, 1974.
[11] Wittrick WH, Williams FW. Buckling and vibration of aniso-
tropic or istropic plate assemblies under combined loadings. Int J
Mech Sci 1974;16:20939.
[12] Wittrick WH, Williams FW. A general algorithm for computing
natural frequencies of elastic structures. Quart J Mech Appl Math
1971;24:26384.
[13] Anderson MS, Williams FW, Wright CJ. Buckling and vibration
of any prismatic assembly of shear and compression loaded
anisotropic plates with an arbitrary supporting structure. Int J
Mech Sci 1983;25:58596.
[14] Williams FW, Anderson MS. Buckling and vibration analysis of
shear-loaded prismatic assemblies with supporting structures,
utilising symmetric or repetitive cross-sections. In: Dawe DJ,
Horsington RW, Kamtekar AG, Little GH, editors. Aspects of
the analysis of plate structuresa volume in honour of WH
Wittrick. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 1985.
[15] Williams FW, Kennedy D. Analysis features of VICONOPT, an
exact buckling and vibration program for prismatic assemblies of
anisotropic plates. Proc 31st AIAA/ASME/ASCE/ASC Struc-
tures, Structural Dynamics and Materials Conf, Long Beach CA
USA, 1990. p. 92029.
[16] Cheung MS, Cheung YK. Natural vibrations of thin at-walled
structures with dierent boundary conditions. J Sound Vibr
1971;18:32537.
[17] Turvey GJ, Wittrick WH. The inuence of orthotropy on the
stability of some multi-plate structures in compression. Aero
Quart 1973;24:18.
[18] Przemieniecki JS. Finite element structural analysis of local
instability. AIAA J 1973;11:339.
[19] Plank RJ, Wittrick WH. Buckling under combined loading of
thin, at-walled structures by a complex nite strip method. Int J
Numer Meth Engng 1974;8:32339.
[20] Petyt M. Finite strip analysis of at skin-stringer structures.
J Sound Vibr 1977;54:53747.
[21] Graves-Smith TR, Sridharan S. A nite strip method for the
buckling of plate structures under arbitrary loading. Int J Mech
Sci 1978;20:68593.
[22] Sridharan S. Doubly symmetric interactive buckling of plate
structures. Int J Solids Struct 1983;19:62541.
[23] Benito R, Sridharan S. Mode interaction in thin-walled structural
members. J Struct Mech ASCE 1985;12:51742.
[24] Mahendran M, Murray NW. Elastic buckling analysis of ideal
thin-walled structures under combined loading using a nite strip
method. Thin-Walled Struct 1986;4:32962.
[25] Dawe DJ. Finite strip buckling analysis of curved plate assemblies
under biaxial loading. Int J Solids Struct 1977;13:114155.
[26] Morris IR, Dawe DJ. Free vibration of curved plate assemblies
with diaphragm ends. J Sound Vibr 1980;73:117.
[27] Dawe DJ, Morris IR. Vibration of curved plate assemblies
subjected to membrane stresses. J Sound Vibr 1982;81:22937.
[28] Petyt M, Fleischer CC. Finite strip analysis of singly curved skin-
stringer structures. J Sound Vibr 1981;77:5671.
[29] Mohd S, Dawe DJ. Buckling and vibration of thin laminated
composite, prismatic shell structures. Compos Struct 1993;25:353
62.
[30] Craig TJ, Dawe DJ. Vibration of shear-deformable laminated
plate structures by the nite strip method. Comput Struct
1987;27:6172.
[31] Dawe DJ, Craig TJ. Buckling and vibration of shear deformable
prismatic plate structures by a complex nite strip method. Int J
Mech Sci 1988;30:7799.
[32] Dawe DJ, Peshkam V. Buckling and vibration of long plate
structures by complex nite strip methods. Int J Mech Sci
1990;32:74366.
[33] Dawe DJ, Peshkam V. Buckling and vibration of nite-length
composite prismatic plate structures with diaphragm ends, part I:
nite strip formulation. Comp Meth Appl Mech Engng
1989;77:130.
[34] Peshkam V, Dawe DJ. Buckling and vibration of nite-length
composite prismatic plate structures with diaphragm ends, part II:
computer programs and buckling applications. Comp Meth Appl
Mech Engng 1989;77:22752.
[35] Peshkam V, Dawe DJ. Buckling and vibration analysis of
composite prismatic plate structures. In: Marshall IH, editor.
Composite Structures-5. London: Elsevier; 1989. p. 46785.
[36] Dawe DJ, Peshkam V. A buckling analysis capability for use in
the design of composite prismatic structures. In: Marshall IH,
Demuts E, editors. Optimum design of composite structures.
London: Elsevier; 1990. p. 3363.
[37] Dawe DJ, Peshkam V. A note on nite strip buckling analysis of
composite plate structures. Compos Struct 1995;31:1638.
[38] Mohd S, Dawe DJ. Finite strip vibration analysis of composite
prismatic shell structures with diaphragm ends. Comput Struct
1993;49:75365.
[39] Hinton E, Ozakca M, Rao MR. Free vibration analysis and shape
optimisation of variable thickness prismatic folded plates and
curved shells, parts 1 and 2. J Sound Vibr 1995;181:55366 and
56781.
[40] Hinton E, Ozakca M, Rao MR. Structural shape optimisation of
vibrating shells and folded plates using two-noded nite strips.
Engng Comput 1993;10:13957.
[41] Loughlan J. A nite strip analysis of the buckling characteristics
of some composite stiened shear panels. Compos Struct
1994;27:28394.
[42] Loughlan J. The buckling performance of composite stiened
panel structures subjected to combined in-plane compression and
shear loading. Compos Struct 1994;29:197212.
[43] Roufaeil OL, Dawe DJ. Vibration analysis of rectangular Mindlin
plates by the nite strip method. Comput Struct 1980;12:83342.
[44] Dawe DJ, Roufaeil OL. Buckling of rectangular Mindlin plates.
Comput Struct 1982;15:46171.
[45] Cheung YK, Fan SC. Static analysis of right box girder bridges by
spline nite strip method. Proc Inst Civil Engrs 1983;75:31123.
[46] Fan SC, Cheung YK. Flexural free vibration of rectangular plates
with complex support conditions. J Sound Vibr 1984;93:8194.
[47] Lau SC, Hancock GJ. Buckling of thin at-walled structures by a
spline nite strip method. Thin-Walled Struct 1986;4:26594.
[48] Hancock GJ, Davids AJ, Key PW, Lau SCW, Rasmussen KJR.
Recent developments in the buckling and non-linear analysis of
thin-walled structural members. Thin-Walled Struct 1990;9:309
38.
[49] Wang S, Dawe DJ. The use of spline functions in calculating the
natural frequencies of anisotropic rectangular laminates. In:
Marshall IH, editor. Composite Structures-4. London: Elsevier;
1987. p. 1.44760.
[50] Dawe DJ, Wang S. Vibration of shear-deformable beams using a
spline-function approach. Int J Numer Meth Engng 1992;33:819
44.
[51] Wang S, Dawe DJ. Vibration of shear-deformable rectangular
plates using a spline-function RayleighRitz approach. Int J
[52] Dawe DJ, Wang S. Buckling of composite plates and plate
structures using the spline nite strip method. Compos Engng
1994;4:1099117.
[53] Wang S, Dawe DJ. Spline nite strip analysis of the buckling and
vibration of composite prismatic plate structures. Int J Mech Sci
1997;39:116180.
[54] Dawe DJ, Wang S. Buckling and vibration analysis of composite
plate and shell structures using the PASSAS software package.
Compos Struct 1997;38:54151.
[55] Wang S, Dawe DJ. Buckling of composite shell structures using
the spline nite strip method. Compos Part B 1999;30B:35164.
[56] Luo R, Edlund B. Buckling analysis of trapezoidally corrugated
panels using spline nite strip method. Thin-Walled Struct
1994;18:20924.
[57] Stroud WJ, Greene WH, Anderson MS. Buckling loads of
stiened panels subjected to combined longitudinal compression
and shear: results obtained with PASCO, EAL and STAGS
computer programs. NASA TP2215, 1984.
[58] de Boor C. A practical guide to splines. Berlin: Springer; 1978.
[59] Bartels RH, Beatty JC, Barsky BA. An introduction to splines for
use in computer graphics and geometric modeling. Los Altos CA:
Morgan Kaufmann; 1987.
[60] Li WY. Spline nite strip analysis of arbitrarily shaped plates and
shells. PhD Thesis, University of Hong Kong, 1988.
[61] Wang S. The use of spline functions in the analysis of composite
laminated plates. PhD Thesis, The University of Birmingham,
1990.
[62] Gutkowski RM, Chen CJ, Puckett JA. Plate bending analysis
by unequally spaced splines. Thin-Walled Struct 1991;11:409
30.
[63] Madasamy CM, Kalyanaraman V. Analysis of plated structures
with rectangular cutouts and internal supports using the nite
strip method. Comput Struct 1994;52:27786.
[64] Tan D, Dawe DJ. Buckling and vibration analysis of composite
laminated plates and shells using general spline function. Compos
Struct 1998;40:2542.
[65] Tan D, Dawe DJ. General spline analysis for buckling and
vibration of prismatic composite laminated plate and shell
structures. Compos Part B 1998;29B:37789.
[66] Dawe DJ, Tan D. Finite strip buckling and free vibration analysis
of stepped rectangular composite laminated plates. Int J Numer
Meth Engng 1999;46:131334.
[67] Graves-Smith TR, Sridharan S. A nite strip method for the post-
locally-buckled analysis of plate structures. Int J Mech Sci
1978;20:83342.
[68] Sridharan S, Graves-Smith TR. Post-buckling analyses with nite
strips. J Eng Mech Div, ASCE 1981;107:86988.
[69] Gierlinski JT, Graves-Smith TR. The geometric non-linear
analysis of thin walled structures by nite strips. Thin-Walled
Struct 1984;2:2750.
[70] Hancock GJ. Non-linear analysis of thin sections in compression.
J Struct Eng Div, ASCE 1981;107:45571.
[71] Bradford MA, Hancock GJ. Elastic interaction of local and
lateral buckling in beams. Thin-Walled Struct 1984;2:125.
[72] Cusens AR, Lengyel P. A nite strip method for the geometrically
non-linear analysis of plate structures. Int J Numer Meth Engng
1983;19:33140.
[73] Dawe DJ, Azizian ZG. Post-buckled stiness of rectangular
orthotropic composite laminates. In: Marshall IH, editor. Com-
posite Structures-4. London: Elsevier; 1987. p. 1.13851.
[74] Dawe DJ, Lam SSE, Azizian ZG. Non-linear nite strip analyses
of rectangular laminates under end shortening, using classical
plate theory. Int J Numer Meth Engng 1992;35:1087110.
[75] Lam SSE, Dawe DJ, Azizian ZG. Nonlinear analysis of rectan-
gular laminates under end shortening, using shear deformation
plate theory. Int J Numer Meth Engng 1993;36:104564.
[76] Dawe DJ, Lam SSE. Analysis of the post-buckling behaviour of
rectangular laminates. Proc 33rd AIAA/ASME/ASCE/AHS/ASC
Structures, Structural Dynamics and Materials Conference, Dal-
las TX, 1992, Part 1, p. 21929.
[77] Dawe DJ, Wang S, Lam SSE. Finite strip analysis of imperfect
laminated plates under end shortening and normal pressure. Int J
[78] Dawe DJ, Lam SSE, Azizian ZG. Finite strip post-local-buckling
analysis of composite prismatic plate structures. Comput Struct
1993;48:101123.
[79] Wang S, Dawe DJ. Finite strip large deection and post-overall-
buckling analysis of diaphragm-supported plate structures. Com-
put Struct 1996;61:15570.
[80] Zhu DS, Cheung YK. Postbuckling analysis of shells by spline
nite strip method. Comput Struct 1989;31:35764.
[81] Kwon YB, Hancock GJ. A nonlinear elastic spline nite strip
analysis for thin-walled sections. Thin-Walled Struct 1991;12:295
319.
[82] Dawe DJ, Wang S. Postbuckling analysis of thin rectangular
laminated plates by spline FSM. Thin-Walled Struct 1998;30:159
79.
[83] Wang S, Dawe DJ. Spline FSM postbuckling analysis of shear
deformable rectangular laminates. Thin-Walled Struct 1999;34:
16378.
[84] Dawe DJ, Wang S. Postbuckling analysis of composite laminated
panels. AIAA J 2000;38:216070.
[85] Dawe DJ, Ge S. Thermal buckling of shear-deformable composite
laminated plates by the spline nite strip method. Comput Meth
Appl Mech Engng 2000;185:34766.
[86] Ge YS. Thermomechanical buckling and postbuckling of com-
posite laminated plates by the B-spline nite strip method. PhD
Thesis, The University of Birmingham, 1999.
[87] Ge YS, Yuan WX, Dawe DJ. Thermomechanical buckling of
rectangular, shear-deformable, composite laminated plates. Struct
Eng and Mech 2002;13:41128.
[88] Prabhu MR, Dhanaraj R. Thermal buckling of laminated
composite plates. Comput Struct 1994;53:1193204.
[89] Khalil MR, Olson MD, Anderson DL. Non-linear dynamic
analysis of stiened plates. Comput Struct 1988;29:92941.
[90] Houlston R. Finite strip analysis of plates and stiened panels
subjected to air blast loads. Comput Struct 1989;32:64759.
[91] Chen J, Dawe DJ. Linear transient analysis of rectangular
laminated plates by a nite strip-mode superposition method.
Compos Struct 1996;35:21328.
[92] Wang S, Chen J, Dawe DJ. Linear transient analysis of rectan-
gular laminates using spline nite strips. Compos Struct 1998;
41:5766.
[93] Chen J, Dawe DJ, Wang S. Nonlinear transient analysis of
rectangular composite laminated plates. Compos Struct 2000;49:
12939.
[94] Chan HC, Cheung YK. Static and dynamic analysis of multi-
layered sandwich plates. Int J Mech Sci 1972;14:399406.
[95] Chan HC, Foo O. Buckling of multi-layer sandwich plates by the
nite strip method. Int J Mech Sci 1977;19:44756.
[96] Chong KP, Cheung YK, Tham LG. Free vibration of formed
sandwich panels. J Sound Vibr 1982;81:57582.
[97] Dawe DJ, Yuan WX. Overall and local buckling of sandwich
plates with laminated faceplates, part I: analysis. Comp Meth
Appl Mech Engng 2001;190:5197213.
[98] Yuan WX, Dawe DJ. Overall and local buckling of sandwich
plates with laminated faceplates, part II: applications. Comp
Meth Appl Mech Engng 2001;190:521531.
[99] Yuan WX, Dawe DJ. Free vibration of sandwich plates with
laminated faceplates. Int J Numer Meth Engng 2002;54:195217.
[100] Yuan WX. Buckling and vibration of compact laminated and
sandwich plate structures by a rened nite strip analysis. PhD
Thesis, The University of Birmingham, 1999.
[101] Pearce TR, Webber JPH. Experimental buckling loads of sand-
wich panels with carbon bre faceplates. Aero Quart 1973;24:295
312.
[102] Wang S, Dawe DJ. Dynamic instability of composite laminated
rectangular plates and prismatic plate structures. Comp Meth
Appl Mech Engng 2002;191:1791826.

Use of The Finite Strip Method in Predicting The Behaviour

Загружено:

Сведения о документе

Оригинальное название

Авторское право

Доступные форматы

Поделиться этим документом

Поделиться или встроить документ

Параметры публикации

Этот документ был вам полезен?

Это неприемлемый материал?

Авторское право:

Доступные форматы

Use of The Finite Strip Method in Predicting The Behaviour

Загружено:

Авторское право:

Доступные форматы

Use of the nite strip method in predicting the behaviour

of composite laminated structures

are associated with

Вам также может понравиться