Buckling of Axially Compressed Conical Shells with Multiple Imperfections

Abstract The influence of single and multiple imperfection cases on the load carrying capacity of mild steel cone subjected to axial compression was considered through numerical simulation in the current paper. Three different imperfection techniques were considered, which are: i) uneven axial length (sinusoidal/square waves), ii) crack, and iii) single load indentation (SLI) imperfection. Abaqus 6.19 FE was used to carry out the numerical simulation. The axial compressive load was applied at the small radius of the cone. Results showed that the buckling load of axially compressed mild steel cone depends on the imperfection approach implemented. The buckling load of cones were seen to be heavily affected by uneven axial length imperfection for both single and multiple imperfection. Also, the effect of multiple imperfection is more noticeable at higher r1/t.