7.

STABILITY PROBLEMS IN SHELL

STRUCTURES
• An efficiency of the membrane stress state, based on the
strength conditions only, enables one to employ a very small
shell thickness. However, a possibility of the shell buckling
impedes that, causing us either to increase the shell thickness or
to reinforce the shell by stiffeners.
• It should be noted that the shell buckling is always disastrous,
unlike, for example, a column or plate buckling. Therefore, the
problem of the stability in designing shell structures is extremely
vital. This problem is made worse because of some specific
difficulties associated with determining correctly the critical
values of loads applied to thin shells.
• The difficulties are much greater than in the buckling analysis of
columns, frames, and flat plates. They are associated with a
complicated mathematical description of the deformed state of
shells, and with a diversity of situations at which a shell can
buckle.
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