Thermal buckling of anti-symmetric composite plates with geometric non-linearity using finite element method

Abstract

Fibre reinforced composite (FRC) is an important material to be considered in the design of structures that require high strength to weight ratio. Examples of these structures are high performance aerospace vehicles such as high speed aircrafts, rockets and launch vehicles. To enhance this property of high strength to weight ration, FRC components are usually made thin and curvy. As a result, one important mode of failure to be considered in these FRC component designs is buckling failure which can be due to compressive mechanical or thermal loading. For the mentioned high performance aerospace vehicles, thermal loading is unavoidable. Thermal loading here is caused by aerodynamic heating which is due to the supersonic or hypersonic flight. This heating will provide the structure’s external skin with thermal compressive load since the inner part of the skin remains cooler and thus restrains the free expansion of the skin. Consequently the outer skin will be subjected to thermal buckling because of the mentioned typical low thickness in the FRC components.