• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
• /
• v.21 no.4
• /
• pp.407-422
• /
• 2005

Plate elements in fully profiled sandwich panels are generally subjected to local buckling failure modes and this behaviour is treated in design by using the conventional effective width method for plates with a width to thickness (b/t) ratio less than 100. If the plate elements are very slender (b/t > 1000), the panel failure is governed by wrinkling instead of local buckling and the strength is determined by the flexural wrinkling formula. The plate elements in fully profiled sandwich panels do not fail by wrinkling as their b/t ratio is generally in the range of 100 to 600. For this plate slenderness region, it was found that the current effective width formula overestimates the strength of the fully profiled sandwich panels whereas the wrinkling formula underestimates it. Hence a new effective width design equation has been developed for practical plate slenderness values. However, no guidelines exist to identify the plate slenderness (b/t) limits defining the local buckling, wrinkling and the intermediate regions so that appropriate design rules can be used based on plate slenderness ratios. A research study was therefore conducted using experimental and numerical studies to investigate the effect of plate slenderness ratio on the ultimate strength behaviour of foam supported steel plate elements. This paper presents the details of the study and the results.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
• /
• v.7 no.5
• /
• pp.433-445
• /
• 1999

Sandwich panels comprising steel facings and a polystyrene foam core are increasingly used as roof and wall claddings in buildings in Australia. When they are subjected to loads causing bending and/or axial compression, the steel plate elements of their profiled facing are susceptible to local buckling. However, when compared to panels with no foam core, they demonstrate significantly improved local buckling behaviour because they are supported by foam. In order to quantify such improvements and to validate the use of available design buckling stress formulae, an investigation using finite element analyses and laboratory experiments was carried out on steel plates that are commonly used in Australia of varying yield stress and thickness supported by a polystyrene foam core. This paper presents the details of this investigation, the buckling results and their comparison with available design buckling formulae.