Abstract
This paper presents a reliability-based shape optimization (RBSO) using the growth-strain method. An actual design involves uncertain conditions such as material property, operational load, Poisson's ratio and dimensional variation. The purpose of the RBSO is to consider the variations of probabilistic constraint and performances caused by uncertainties. In this study, the growth-strain method was applied to shape optimization of reliability analysis. Even though many papers for reliability-based shape optimization in mathematical programming method and ESO (Evolutionary Structural Optimization) were published, the paper for the reliability-based shape optimization using the growth-strain method has not been applied yet. Growth-strain method is applied to performance measure approach (PMA), which has probabilistic constraints that are formulated in terms of the reliability index, is adopted to evaluate the probabilistic constraints in the change of average mises stress. Numerical examples are presented to compare the DO with the RBSO. The results of design example show that the RBSO model is more reliable than deterministic optimization. It was verified that the reliability-based shape optimization using growth-strain method are very effective for general structure. The purpose of this study is to improve structure's safety considering probabilistic variable.