Applied Mathematics and Mechanics Published by SU,

(English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 4, Apr. 1999) Shanghai, China

TORSIONAL BUCKLING OF SPHERICAL SHEI,TS

UNDER C I R ~ I A L SHEAR LOADS

Zhang Yinyi ( ~ : ~ )
Institute of EngineeringMechanics, Nanchang University,
Nanchang 330029, P R China
(Communicated by ILuo HaianJ ; Received Nov. 17, 1997; Revised Sep. 22, 1998)

Abstract: By the aid of differential geometry analysis on the initial buckling of

shell element, a set of new and exact buckling bifurcation equations of the spherical
shells is derived. Making"use of Galerkln variational method, the general stability
of the hinged spherical shells with the circumferential shear loads is studied.
Constructing the buckling mode close to the bifurcation point deformations, the
critical eigenvalues , critical load intensities and critical stresses of torsional buckling
ranging from the shallow shells to the hemispherical shell are obtained for the first
time.

Key words: sphericalshell; buckling bifurcation equation; circumferential shear

load; eigenvalue; buckling critical value
Introduction
Important applications of the stability analysis of shells can be found in the modem
engineering ranging over the aerospace, marine, architecture, chemical industry, machinery and
instruments. The buckling of elastic shell structures usually takes place under combined loadings,
the torsional loads being often included. Bene~ting from the successful design of the spiral dimple
for the cylindrical shells (E. Schwerin, 1925), the studies on the pure torsional buckling (L. H.
Donnell, 1933 ), combined torsional buckling (S. B. Batdorf, M. Stein, M. Schildcrout,
1947), impact torsional buckling (Wang Deyu, Zhang Shanyuan, Yang Guitong, 1993), and
large deflection of laminated cylinders in torsion (G. J. Simitses, D. Shaw, I. Sheinman,
1985) have been lively, and a wealth of references has been accumulated[1-7] Due to
mathematical difficulties in complex shell geometry, the stability analysis of the spherical and
conical shells remains at a level lacking torsional loads for a long time. Reference ["8 ] presented
the buckling bifurcation solutions of the conical shells under torsional couples ranging from the
shallow shells (half vertex angle75 ~ ~< a < 90~ ) to the deep shells ( 5~ < a < 75~ ) for the first
time. In this paper, employing the differential geometry of surfaces, a set of new and exact
buckling bifurcation equations of the spherical shells is derived. Following the Galerkin procedure
which is used for the buckling analysis of hinged spherical shells under the circumferential shear
loads, the buckling critical values ranging from the shallow shells (edge angle a ~< 3& ) to the
hemispherical shells ( a = 90~ ) are given, and the interaction curves for the critical eigenvalues,
critical load intensifies and critical stresses are plotted respectively. Consequently, another
apparent void is filled. With the torsional buckling of the cytindrical, spherical and conical shells
being compared, it is indicated that the study results will be of better theoretical and practical
426
 Torsional Buckling of Spherical Shells 427

value.

1 Buckling Bifurcation Equations

For small loads the spherical shell is in the unique membrane equilibrium and remains
relatively stiff deformations. When the loads increase and become equal to the critical values,
under arbitrary perturbations the spherical shell continuously transits to a softer bending
equilibrium which is of the bifurcation system, and buckles to a dimple of reversed curvature.
Assume that/~0 and ~ + NO., Q~, Mo.denote the internal forces of two states, while u~ and %.
are infinitesimal incremental quantifies of the displacements and strains, respectively, in
sufficiently small neighborhood of the bifurcation point (Fig. 1 ).

"' [•/~q3 -x;~-~c~2

C ':L Ir ..~1/ '20+

+Nd W " /'-,

! M.
o

Fig. 1 Bifurcation point buckling of spherical shell

The differential geometry of surfaces being applied, the small strains %. and rotations
1 [ K l ( 9 ) u i + K2(9) 8ui 02ui ]

of the deformable shell element are given, where the parameters /~ represent the principal
coordinates 9 and 0. As a result of describing the deformations of initial bucklings, the
bifurcation exluatiom of spherical shells are derived

Rsin9 ~--~N Rcosg(N~ No) + R ~ - ~ + sin9 aMr cosg(M~ 3tlo) + ~ +

89 + - 89 + -
8u
889,N~~ cos9 u + ~8V + sincpw) + NO(cos~.ff-9~ ~'v 8w w) +
- sin9 u + a - ~ + sin9 -~9 + cos9
( 02U o~U t92V 0V OqW )
fiPo c~ ~ - cos9 ~ + sin9 u - 0980 - cot9 ~ - sin 9 ~ - cosgw +

80 ~ ' ~ + + 0980 - c~ 8-0 - sin9 ~892 - c~ ~ +

cosec 9 v + (
+ qlR sin 9 ~ +cos 9 u + ~ - ~ +2sin 9 w ) = 0, (la)

RsingaN~ 2Re~ R ONo 0M~ 2e~ OMo

89 + + ~ +sin 9 09 + +~ + 89 x
 428 Zhang Yinyi

( cosq~ u + ~ov + sinq~ w ) + - cosecq~ ~'~ + 2cos9 ~ - 2sinq~ u + 2 ~ +

cot~o ~-~ + 2sin9 ~ + 2cos~o w + ~ - a~oao + r ~ + sinso a~o2~ +

costp ~a~ - cosecq~v) + -a -~~/ ~ ~~-'~ + ~1 + ~ ( ~* ~ )

+ ~-~/
a~ +

(
q2R sin~o ~ )
+ cos~o u + ~-~ + 2sincp w = O, (lb)
a2Mo
sin~ a2M~
a~o2 + eos~ (2M~ - Me) + eosec~o - ~ - + (eos~p.eogo - eosee~o) x

(M,- Mo) + 2 a2M_~

~ + 2cot~o aMr
aO - R s i n g ( N , + No) -

s i n ~ o ~ + eos~ou + ~ - /~o s i n ~ +cos~u +~- eosee~o 002 -

eos~o ~ + sin~o w - /3/0r 2sin~o ~ + eos~o v - 2 ~ + eot~o ~-~ +

qsR(sin~oOu/aq~ + eos~o u + av/O0 + 2sinq~ w) = 0. (le)
Careful comparison with various available equations of stability for the flexible spherical
shells demonstrates that the derived equations are new, exact and perfect. The evident advantages
lie in that they do not restrict the loads or boundary forms and display clear relationshop between
the internal forces and deformations. Hence the overall analysis and precise calculation are
possible for the perfect structures [~- 3, 9].

2 Circumferential Shear Buckling

A spherical shell has the hinged supports at the bottom and is subjected to the circumferential
shear loads distributed in a sine function along the
T- meridian for any edge angle a, as depicted in Fig. 2.
h
1 ql = 0, q2 = rosin ~a-~' q3 = 0. (2)
For the spherical shell which is in the critical
equilibrium state, the internal forces can be calculated
~=o, ~=o,
foR ~ f
u~ ' = - 2 + 7 / d ~ o s o e ~ l - ~in~ ~ oos t2 +
q2(~,~a)~ -0 0 _

"~( ~a-~) 1
a l-cos +2-rt/a x

(3)
After bifurcation buckling, the boundary
Fig. 2 Spherical shell with circum. conditions are taken as
ferential shear loads ( u , v , w ) ~ = ~ = O, (M~)~_, = 0. (4)
The geomelric equations
 Torsional Buckling of Spherical Shells 429

3u w u Ov
+~,

3u 8v v

~.~ = - 3 2 w / R 2 0 ~ 2, (5)
02 w
OW ~ - cosec2 q9 R2002 '
Z0 = - eot~o R28q

32w 3w
- - 0 + cot~o coseccp R230,
Z r = - cosecp R23qgO

and elastic equations

= C(% + m0), M~ = D ( Z~ +/~Z0), ]
No = C( o Mo = D( Xo + t~Z~) ,
? (6)
Nr =1- M e = (1 - / , ) Z ~ Z ~ , |
2
/
C = gt/(1-/~2), D = Et3/12(1-/~z) j
must be satisfied too.
The nondimensional quantifies are introduced in the following:

Ul -~ - - , /1"2 = , U3 = - - , ~ = --, V = 87t4 h t

t 7 t a
f = ( 1 - l~)roR t2 (R) 2 Z'o ~ = 4 r--9
~ (7)
2(2 + ~ ) G t ' g = -~' Qcr = ~-~ 2(1 + / ~ ) G ' rk '

T, = (1 - / z ) ~ - ~ r~,
G' T~ = 24(1 - / ~ 2 ) ,--
4 ~ r~,
-'~,
where G, F , ro and r= are the shear modulus, o.o~
Poisson's ratio, buckling load intensity and critical t t t t~
0.020
stress, respectively, while v is the shell parameter.
According to the energy criterion of stability, o.0~5
the ideal buckling mode corresponds to the ,~
constraints, closes to the bfftwcation point o.o~0
deformations, and minimizes the buckling critical
values. This mode may be constructed of the 0.o05
trigonometric functions
0.001
ul = A l , ( s i n ~ o , sina)sin~o sinn0, ] ' i ' ~ v'~ ' ~ ' ~
uz A2.(cos~o- eosa)sinq~ eosn0, 1 (8)
u3 A3.(sin~o - sina)sin~o sinn0. J Fig. 3 Critical dgenvalue curves
The buckling mode number n depends on the shell parameter v and reflects the mode
characteristic.
Subsdtuting Eqs. ( 2 ) ~ ( 8 ) into the bifiam~don equations ( 1 ) i the displacement-type
governing equations of torsional buckling are
V,(~o,O,n,a,v,Aj,) = 0 (i,j = 1,2,3). (9)
 430 Zhang Yinyi

With the use of Galerkin variational method,

2f2'~f~
R .o ,o F~Su:ingdpdO = 0 (i = 1,2,3), (10)
for the unknown coefficients { A/, }, the homogeneous equations are found and can be represented as
[K#.]{A~} = 0 ( i , j = 1,2,3), (11)
where the matrix [ K#.] needs much calculating effort.
The existence of the valid solutions of { A/,,} # {0} is a necessary condition to maintain shell
equilibrium in the bifurcation point deformation state. Solve the equations
aet[K0.] = 0 (i,y = 1,2,3), (12)
and for the critical eigenvaluef ~ , the associated load intensity r0 and critical stress re, of torsional
buckling are obtained.

3 Numerical Results

The values of geometry parameter v are adopted at the ratio R / t between 125 and 2850 and
the edge angle a between 10~ and 90~ The shells are made of the modem light-weight and high-
strength materials. The material parameters are taken as
G = 26.92 x 103MPa, /z = 0.3.
The calculation which involves mass terms and is multiplicate and staggering looks rather
complicated. However, because of desired regularity, the numerical results are precise and
satisfactory.
Fig. 3 presents the tidy data and smoothly rising curves of critical eigenvalue fcr with
increasing geometry parameter v for any edge angle a. The buckling mode number net becomes
large as v increases, and there is a great difference between shallow shell and hemispherical shell.
In reality, an active region of engineering applications is given on the figure.
20 ' ,' ' . . . . . . . , , 9 o - .1.5,

/l~r
15 n==4-21
1.13
22 25 26 2._7 f
d m
0.5
n ~ , = 5 - 28
5

o ' 5 ' 'ib .... i'5 2o o

11 la

Fig. 5 Relative value curves of

Fig. 4 Buckling load intensity curve load intensities

A curve of the buckling load intensity Qc, versus the geometry parameter v is illustrated in
Fig. 4. As the parameter u increases, the load intensity Qc, drops gradually from the maximum
Qc~ = 12.575 1 to the minimum Q~, = 10.749 2, and then rises slightly, and its change is small.
in the complete domain. The buckling mode number no, increases rapidly following v. "
Fig. 5 plots the relative value 8 curves of the load intensities. Here r~ denotes the load
intensity of the buckling mode number nc~ = 3 ~ 14. It is seen that the curves parallel almost to
 Torsional Buckling of Spherical Shells 431

2.5
2 . 8 V . . . . ' . ~ , - I I . . . . t . . . .

2.0 2.4t-
n,,= 11 ~ 2 6 ~
2.01-

~
1.5
,.= 5 - 2 9 1.6~
1.0 1.2F
0.81-
0.5 =4- 8
0.4~

' '5 .... 10 . . . . 1; . . . . 2o 5 10 15 20 25

V

Fig. 6 Critical stress T, curves Fig. 7 Critical stress T. curves

the abscissa v and the change of load intensity r0 is stable on the whole.
Fig. 6 shows the critical stress T, curves. Clearly, the rising curves steepen before reaching
the hemispherical shell, and due to the close geometry parameters two groups of buckling critical
stresses approach each other.
Two groups of bifurcation buckling adopting data being far apart are illustrated in Fig. 7.
One shorter curve represents the shallow shell, and the longer curve represents the deep shell
(30 ~ < a ~< 90~ As the geometry parameter v increases, both critical stresses and critical stress
increments of the deep shell are bigger than that of the shallow shell.
All these calculations have not been simplified in any way, and the presented results are
normal and desirable. It has been confm'ned that the buckling bifurcation equations derived in this
study are correct and exact and the general stability analysis should be made on the exact
equations basis.
Finally, comparing the torsional buckling of the cylindrical, spherical and conical
shells [4'6-s] has disclosed that 1 ) In every shell the critical stresses increase as the shell
parameters ( t / l , a , t/1 ) or ( t / R , bt/R, ~r/2 - a ) increase. 2) On the load-carrying capacity
for stability, the deep shell is stronger than the shallow shell, while the spherical and conical
shells are stronger than the cylindrical shell.

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