Light weight structures in the aerospace, mechanical engineering or civil engineering are on the one hand under compression or shear loading susceptible for buckling but on the other hand they have large reserve capacities in the postbuckling region. In order to save weight in these fields the use of materials made of Carbon-Fibre-Reinforced-Plastics (CFRP) is increasing. However, the design and computation of composite structures is more challenging than using classic materials. Stability, non-linear computations and degradation have therefore here an essential relevance. The structural behaviour of stability and deformations is simulated by nonlinear numerical simulations and experiments. Figure 1 illustrates the comparison of an experiment and simulation of a buckled, stringer-stiffened (on the reverse side) CFRP panel. The institute has in the field of stability of thin-walled composite structures competence in the following 4 main topics: Postbuckling behaviour, Imperfection tolerance, Buckling due to dynamic loading, Thermo-mechanical buckling. The objective is to develop fast and reliable software tools in order to simulate the buckling and postbuckling behaviour up to collapse. These software tools can then be incorporated into a design process as well as to deduce simple design rules. To fulfil these tasks numerical and experimental work is essential. The experimental examination is employed to provide a better understanding of the physical behaviour of the structure and to validate the developed software tools.
Our competence:
Running projects:
Some finished projects: