Abstract
This paper analyse the mechanical characteristics of geometrical and material nonlinearity behavior of cylindrical shell roofs subjected to a concentrated load. The shell elements were modeled using 'NISA2016' software as 3D general shell element and 3D composite shell element. The 3D shell element includes deformation due to bending, membrane, membrane-bending coupling and shear perpendicular to the grain effects is suited for modeling moderately thick or thin general shells and laminated composite shells. And The 3D composite shell element consists of a number of layers of perfectly bonded anisotropic and orthotropic materials. The purpose of this research is to analysis the load-deflection curves considering the combined geometric and material nonlinearity of cylindrical shells. In a shallowed cylindrical shell, snap-through curve can be found.