• Interaction and multiscale mechanics
• /
• v.1 no.1
• /
• pp.143-156
• /
• 2008

Elliptical tubes may buckle in an elastic local buckling failure mode under uniform compression. Previous analyses of the local buckling of these members have assumed that the cross-section is hollow, but it is well-known that the local buckling capacity of thin-walled closed sections may be increased by filling them with a rigid medium such as concrete. In many applications, the medium many not necessarily be rigid, and the infill can be considered to be an elastic material which interacts with the buckling of the elliptical tube that surrounds it. This paper uses an energy-based technique to model the buckling of a thin-walled elliptical tube containing an elastic infill, which elucidates the physics of the buckling phenomenon from an engineering mechanics basis, in deference to a less generic finite element approach to the buckling problem. It makes use of the observation that the local buckling in an elliptical tube is localised with respect to the contour of the ellipse in its cross-section, with the localisation being at the region of lowest curvature. The formulation in the paper is algebraic and it leads to solutions that can be determined by implementing simple numerical solution techniques. A further extension of this formulation to a stiffness approach with multiple degrees of buckling freedom is described, and it is shown that using the simple one degree of freedom representation is sufficiently accurate for determining the elastic local buckling coefficient.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
• /
• v.47 no.4
• /
• pp.15-24
• /
• 2005

This study is focused on modeling to predict the behavior of two-way RC slabs. A new finite element model will be presented to analyze the nonlinear behavior of RC slabs. The numerical approach is based on the p-version degenerate shell element including theory of anisotropic laminated composites, theory of materially and geometrically nonlinear plates. In the nonlinear formulation of this model, the total Lagrangian formulation is adopted with large deflections and moderate rotations being accounted for in the sense of von Karman hypothesis. The material model is based on the Kuper's yield criterion, hardening rule, and crushing condition. The validity of the proposed p-version nonlinear RC finite element model is demonstrated through the load-deflection curves and the ultimate loads. It is shown that the proposed model is able to adequately predict the deflection and ultimate load of two-way slabs with respect to steel arrangements and steel ratios.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.41-58
• /
• 2004

The postbuckling behaviour of thin shells has fascinated researchers because the theoretical prediction and their experimental verification are often different. In reality, shell panels possess small imperfections and these can cause large reduction in static buckling strength. This is more relevant in thin laminated composite shells. To study the postbuckling behaviour of thin, imperfect laminated composite shells using finite elements, explicit incremental or secant matrices have been presented in this paper. These incremental matrices which are derived using Marguerre's shallow shell theory can be used in combination with any thin plate/shell finite element (Classical Laminated Plate Theory - CLPT) and can be easily extended to the First Order Shear deformation Theory (FOST). The advantage of the present formulation is that it involves no numerical approximation in forming total potential energy of the shell during large deformations as opposed to earlier approximate formulations published in the literature. The initial imperfection in shells could be modeled by simply adjusting the ordinate of the shell forms. The present formulation is very easy to implement in any existing finite element codes. The secant matrices presented in this paper are shown to be very accurate in tracing the postbuckling behaviour of thin isotropic and laminated composite shells with general initial imperfections.

• Earthquakes and Structures
• /
• v.18 no.2
• /
• pp.263-273
• /
• 2020

The use of energy concepts in seismic analysis and design of structures requires the understanding of the input energy response of multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) systems subjected to strong ground motions. For design purposes and non-time consuming analysis, however, it would be beneficial to associate the input energy response of MDOF systems with those of single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) systems. In this paper, the theoretical formulation of energy input to MDOF systems is developed on the basis that only a particular portion of the total mass distributed among floor levels is effective in the nth-mode response. The input energy response histories of several reinforced concrete frames subjected to a set of eleven horizontal acceleration histories selected from actual recorded events and scaled in time domain are obtained. The contribution of the fundamental mode to the total input energy response of MDOF frames is demonstrated both graphically and numerically. The input energy of the fundamental mode is found to be a good indicator of the total energy input to two-dimensional regular MDOF structures. The numerical results computed by the proposed formulation are verified with relative input energy time histories directly computed from linear time history analysis. Finally, the elastic input energies are compared with those computed from time history analysis of nonlinear MDOF systems.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
• /
• v.52 no.1
• /
• pp.173-203
• /
• 2014

The cross-section warping due to the passage of high-speed trains can be a relevant issue to consider in the dynamic analysis of bridges due to (i) the usual layout of railway systems, resulting in eccentric moving loads; and (ii) the use of cross-sections prone to warping deformations. A thin-walled beam formulation for the dynamic analysis of bridges including the cross section warping is presented in this paper. Towards a numerical implementation of the beam formulation, a finite element with seven degrees of freedom is proposed. In order to easily consider the compatibility between elements, and since the coupling between flexural and torsional effects occurs in non-symmetric cross-sections due to dynamic effects, a single axis is considered for the element. The coupled flexural-torsional free vibration of thin-walled beams is analysed through the presented beam model, comparing the results with analytical solutions presented in the literature. The dynamic analysis due to an eccentric moving load, which results in a coupled flexural-torsional vibration, is considered in the literature by analytical solutions, being therefore of a limited applicability in practice engineering. In this paper, the dynamic response due to an eccentric moving load is obtained from the proposed finite element beam model that includes warping by a modal analysis.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers
• /
• v.12 no.3
• /
• pp.575-581
• /
• 1988

To integrate the two-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations numerically in multiply-connected flow regions, the vorticity-stream function formulation is used. The steady stream function value at the surface of the multibody, initially unknown, has been determined interactively by introducing a line integral which requires the single-valuedness of pressure at each interaction step. This procedure is relatively simpler and more efficient than the primitive variable formulation which requires much more computing time and shows poor convergence. Three doubly-connected flow problems are defined and numerically analyzed by the present method. The results have been compared either with earlier existing ones or with the experimental interferograms to demon-strate the validity of the presented method.

• Steel and Composite Structures
• /
• v.4 no.4
• /
• pp.281-301
• /
• 2004

The paper begins by presenting a unified variational approach to the lateral-torsional buckling (LTB) analysis of doubly symmetric prismatic and tapered thin-walled beams with open cross-sections, which accounts for the influence of the pre-buckling deflections. This approach (i) extends the kinematical assumptions usually adopted for prismatic beams, (ii) consistently uses shell membrane theory in general coordinates and (iii) adopts Trefftz's criterion to perform the bifurcation analysis. The proposed formulation is then applied to investigate the influence of the pre-buckling deflections on the LTB behaviour of prismatic and web-tapered I-section simply supported beams and cantilevers. After establishing an interesting analytical result, valid for prismatic members with shear centre loading, several elastic critical moments/loads are presented, discussed and, when possible, also compared with values reported in the literature. These numerical results, which are obtained by means of the Rayleigh-Ritz method, (i) highlight the qualitative differences existing between the LTB behaviours of simply supported beams and cantilevers and (ii) illustrate how the influence of the pre-buckling deflections on LTB is affected by a number of factors, namely ($ii_1$) the minor-to-major inertia ratio, ($ii_2$) the beam length, ($ii_3$) the location of the load point of application and ($ii_4$) the bending moment diagram shape.

• Smart Structures and Systems
• /
• v.14 no.4
• /
• pp.699-718
• /
• 2014

The indirect displacement estimation using acceleration and strain (IDEAS) method is extended to various types of beam structures beyond the previous validation on the prismatic or near-prismatic beams. By fusing different types of responses, the IDEAS method is able to estimate displacements containing pseudo-static components with high frequency noise to be significantly reduced. However, the concerns to the IDEAS method come from possible disagreement of the assumed sinusoidal mode shapes to the actual mode shapes, which allows the IDEAS method to be valid only for simply-supported prismatic beams and limits its applicability to real world problems. In this paper, the extension of the IDEAS method to the general types of beams is investigated by the mathematical formulation of the modal mapping matrix only for the monitored substructure, so-called monitoring span. The formulation particularly considers continuous and wide beams to extend the IDEAS method to general beam structures that reflect many real bridges. Numerical simulations using four types of beams with various irregularities are presented to show the effectiveness and accuracy of the IDEAS method in estimating displacements.

• Steel and Composite Structures
• /
• v.8 no.2
• /
• pp.129-144
• /
• 2008

This paper demonstrates an application of the perturbation based stochastic finite element method (SFEM) for predicting the performance of structural systems made of composite sections with random material properties. The composite member consists of materials in contact each of which can surround a finite number of inclusions. The perturbation based stochastic finite element analysis can provide probabilistic behavior of a structure, only the first two moments of random variables need to be known, and should therefore be suitable as an alternative to Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) for realizing structural analysis. A summary of stiffness matrix formulation of composite systems and perturbation based stochastic finite element dynamic analysis formulation of structural systems made of composite sections is given. Two numerical examples are presented to illustrate the method. During stochastic analysis, displacements and sectional forces of composite systems are obtained from perturbation and Monte Carlo methods by changing elastic modulus as random variable. The results imply that perturbation based SFEM method gives close results to MCS method and it can be used instead of MCS method, especially, if computational cost is taken into consideration.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.24 no.3
• /
• pp.319-328
• /
• 1992

The Galerkin formulation of the finite element method is applied to the integral law of the first-order form of the one-group neutron transport equation in one-dimensional spherical geometry. Piecewise linear or quadratic Lagrange polynomials are utilized in the integral law for the angular flux to establish a set of linear algebraic equations. Numerical analyses are performed for the scalar flux distribution in a heterogeneous sphere as well as for the criticality problem in a uniform sphere. For the criticality problems in the uniform sphere, the results of the finite element method, with the use of continuous finite elements in space and angle, are compared with the exact solutions. In the heterogeneous problem, the scalar flux distribution obtained by using discontinuous angular and spatical finite elements is in good agreement with that from the ANISN code calculation.