Effect of Loading on Plate Analysis

Plates with cutouts in aerospace, civil, mechanical and marine structures are inevitable mainly for practical and design considerations. In many circumstances these structures are found to be exposed to in-plane loading. The applied load is seldom uniform and the boundary conditions may be completely arbitrary in practice. The buckling and vibration characteristics of stiffened plates with cutout with cutouts pose a tremendous challenge and must be properly understood in the design of such structures. The buckling and vibration characteristics of stiffened plates subjected to in-plane partial edge loadings are studied using finite element method. Buckling loads and vibration frequencies are determined for different plate aspect ratios, edge conditions. Vibration and buckling calculations for rectangular plates subjected to non-uniform in-plane stress distribution were studied by different investigators [1-3]. The effects of stiffener location on vibration and buckling characteristics have been discussed. Yamiki [4] analyzed the plate subjected to locally distributed in-plane loading over a finite length of the edge at the center of two opposite edges. Baker and Pavolic [5] analyzed the stability of rectangular plates subjected to a pair of patch loading at the center of two opposite
edges by using Ritz method.