| Abstract: | Stresses in the vicinity of free edges and corners of composite laminates exhibit a distinct localized three‐dimensional behaviour 1] and thus represent an important technical situation. Since numerical analyses of stress concentration phenomena in layered structures are computationally expensive, the present contribution is devoted to a simple closed‐form higher‐order theory approach for the calculation of displacements, strains and stresses in the vicinity of a rectangular corner of symmetric cross‐ply laminates under uniform thermal load ΔT. An appropriate representation for the displacement field in the form of a single‐layer theory with unknown inplane components and appropriately assumed functions through the plate thickness yields closed‐form expressions for the strains and stresses throughout the whole laminate. Equilibrium and boundary conditions are fulfilled in an integral sense. The present approach is easily applied, is of a completely closed‐form analytic nature and requires only little computational effort. (© 2004 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim) |
