Sādhanā | 2021
Effects of stiffener geometric parameters on the buckling and post-buckling response of composite I-stiffened panels
Abstract
The buckling instability and post-buckling carrying capacity are major concerns in the engineering design of composite stiffened panels and are influenced by a series of design parameters. This work investigated the rule and mechanism of the stiffener flange widths effects on the buckling instability and post-buckling response of composite I-stiffened panels under axial compression. With the compression experiments, the buckling instability and post-buckling response of the composite I-stiffened panels were obtained and further used in the validation of the finite-element (FE) model. A parametric study was then implemented in analyzing the effects of stiffener flange widths on the structural buckling instability and post-buckling response. The results indicate that skin-stiffener debonding and intra-laminar damage are the main failure modes. The structural buckling instability, carrying capacity and failure behavior are sensitive to the parameters of stiffener flange widths. The bottom flange width w b linearly affects the critical buckling load, but has no effects on the buckling mode. The top flange width w t simultaneously affects the critical buckling load and buckling mode, and an obvious buckling mode change occurs around a critical w t value. Both the bottom and top flange widths affect the structural damage process, failure mode and carrying capacity obviously.