Reliability Assessment of Functionally Graded Material Under Thermal Loading

Abstract

In this paper, the reliability index of the stainless steel and alumina Functionally Graded Beam (FGB) subjected to various boundary conditions and changes in temperature is studied. A FGB of known dimensions with material properties graded according to power law distribution is considered. Effects of boundary conditions, material grading and temperature on the reliability index of the beam are studied under various loading conditions. In order to evaluate the reliability index of the beam, First Order Reliability Method II (FORM-II) is employed. The code written in MATLAB pertaining to the proposed approach is validated with an isotropic beam problem whose results are available in literature. With an objective to formulate a relationship between reliability index and various parameters to assist designing under constraints, an attempt is made to study and derive a relationship of reliability index as a function of power law index, temperature and boundary conditions. Explicit expressions of analytical correlation to some specific problems under different boundary conditions and temperature are deduced to demonstrate the usefulness of the correlation.