Numerical Analysis of Axisymmetric Buckling of a Conical Shell under Radial Compression

The nonlinear boundary-value problem of the axisymmetric buckling of a simply supported conical shell (dome) under a radial compressive load applied to the supported edge is formulated for a system of six first-order ordinary differential equations for independent fields of finite displacements and rotations. Multivalued solutions are obtained using the shooting method with specified accuracy. For various values of the loading parameter, bifurcation of the solutions of the problem is studied and a parametric branching diagram is constructed. The buckling modes are obtained for three branches of the solution. Curves of the buckling modes corresponding to three isolated branches of the solution are given.