Comparisons of test and theory for nonsymmetric elastic-plastic buckling of shells of revolution

Experimental and analytical buckling pressures are presented for very carefully fabricated thin cylindrical shells with 45, 60 and 75° conical heads and for cylindrical shells with torispherical heads pierced by axisymmetric cylindrical nozzles of various thicknesses and diameters. Nonsymmetric buckling occurs at pressures for which some of the material is loading plastically in the neighborhoods of stress concentrations caused by meridional slope discontinuities. The buckling pressures for the cone-cylinder vessels are predicted within 2.6 per cent and for the pierced torispherical vessels within 4.4 per cent with use of BOSOR5, a computer program based on the finite difference energy method in which axisymmetric large deflections, nonlinear material properties and nonsymmetric bifurcation buckling are accounted for. The predicted buckling pressures of the pierced torispherical specimens are rather sensitive to details of the analytical model in the neighborhood of the juncture between the nozzle and the head. The buckling pressures of the cone-cylinder vessels can be accurately predicted by treatment of the wall material as elastic, enforcement of the full compatibility conditions at the juncture in the prebuckling analysis, and release of the rotation compatibility condition in the bifurcation (eigenvalue) analysis.