Bending of Orthogonally Stiffened Plates

Abstract

Abstract In this paper the flexure theory for plates of orthotropic material is applied in the case of orthogonally stiffened plates using an experimental method to determine plate stiffnesses in bending and in twisting. Once these stiffnesses, or elastic moduli, have been determined by test they may be used in calculating bending deflections for plates of identical stiffened construction but any given boundary conditions. As an example, calculated deflections of a stiffened circular plate with clamped edge are compared with those which were determined experimentally. It is also demonstrated that the theory can be applied to the case of vibration of a stiffened plate if in addition to the orthotropic elastic constants the weight per unit area of the plate is determined. The various experimental results show considerable promise for use of the proposed combination of theory and experimental method in the analysis of both statically and dynamically loaded plates with attached stiffeners.