INELASTIC BUCKLING OF RECTANGULAR SANDWICH PLATES

An analytical study of buckling of rectangular sandwich plates, stress ed uniaxially by uniform shortening beyond the elastic limits of compo nent materials, is presented. The analysis is based on the inelastic b ehavior according to both the J2-incremental and J2-deformation theori es of plasticity. Taking the loaded edges as simply supported, the gov erning equations are solved for (a) plates simply supported on all fou r sides, and (b) plates simply supported on three sides and free on th e fourth side. The theory give rise to two sets of boundary conditions , each representing ''simple support''. It is shown that these alterna tive choices lead to significantly different predictions of the buckli ng load in the case of sandwich plates simply supported on three sides and free on the fourth, unloaded side. The presented analysis can be specialized to elastic buckling of sandwich plates, and also to elasti c or plastic buckling of homogeneous (one-material) plates with or wit hout the transverse shear effects.