LAYER-WISE APPROACH FOR THE BIFURCATION PROBLEM IN LAMINATED COMPOSITES WITH DELAMINATIONS

Buckling of axially loaded composite beam plates with multiple delaminations is studied. The delaminations are assumed to extend through the width of the composite. A finite element method based on a layer-wise plate theory is developed to formulate the problem. Numerical results are obtained, addressing the effects of the number of delaminations, their lengths, through-the-thickness locations, and axial locations on the critical buckling load and corresponding mode shapes of the composite laminate. It is found that the proposed approach is very efficient and yields accurate solutions with significant savings in computing time compared with the commonly used plane elasticity finite element method for analyzing delamination buckling problems in composites.