Abstract: | The buckling modes of cylindrical shells made of a polymeric composite with creep properties are considered. The initial imperfections of the shell are characterized by a Fourier series. The time dependence of a large number of harmonics of the Fourier series is investigated by means of nonlinear equations of the Timoshenko type. It is established that some are damped, while others grow at an ever-increasing rate. It is shown that in the course of time the effective shape of the deflections is transformed and at the critical moment the shell buckles in a mode that differs from the shape of the initial deflections.Institute of Polymer Mechanics, Academy of Sciences of the Latvian SSR, Riga. Translated from Mekhanika Polimerov, No. 4, pp. 697–703, July–August, 1971. |