Buckling of functionally graded stiffened and unstiffened plates using finite strip method

Abstract

This paper deals with local buckling analysis of rectangular functionally graded material plates using finite strip method and based on classical plate theory. The modulus of elasticity of the plate is assumed to vary according to a power-law distribution in terms of the volume fractions of the constituents. The principle of minimum total potential energy is employed to obtain stiffness and stability matrices of functionally graded plate while a matrix eigenvalue problem is then solved to find the critical stresses of rectangular plates subjected to various types of loading including uniform and non-uniform uniaxial loadings and biaxial uniform loading. The accuracy of the proposed model is validated in which the obtained results are compared with those reported elsewhere. Furthermore, a comprehensive parametric study is performed to investigate the effects of various parameters such as boundary conditions, power law index, aspect ratio and type of loading on the local buckling coefficient of functionally graded material plates whilst the developed finite strip method is also employed to study the buckling behaviour of long stiffened functionally graded plates subjected to uniform uniaxial loading.