Mechanical Stability Investigation of Advanced Composite Plates Resting on Elastic Foundations Using a New Four-Unknown Refined Theory

Abstract

A refined and simple shear deformation theory for mechanical buckling of composite plate resting on two-parameter Pasternak’s foundations is developed. The displacement field is chosen based on assumptions that the in-plane and transverse displacements consist of bending and shear components, and the shear components of in-plane displacements give rise to the parabolic variation of shear strain through the thickness in such a way that shear stresses vanish on the plate surfaces.Therefore, there is no need to use shear correction factor. The number of independent unknowns of present theory is four, as against five in other shear deformation theories.It is assumed that the warping of the cross sections generated by transverse shear is presented by a hyperbolic function. The stability equations are determined using the present theory and based on the existence of material symmetry with respect to the median plane.The nonlinear strain-displacement of Von Karman relations are also taken into consideration. .The boundary conditions for the plate are assumed to be simply supported in all edges. Closed-form solutions are presented to calculate the critical load of mecanical buckling, which are useful for engineers in design. The effects of the foundation parameters,side-to-thickness ratio and modulus ratio, the isotropic and orthotropic square plates are considered in this analysis.are presented comprehensively for the mechanical buckling of rectangular composite plates.