14th World Congress on Computational Mechanics (WCCM)

ECCOMAS Congress 2020

19–24 July 2020, Paris, France

AN ISOGEOMETRIC SOLID-SHELL MODEL FOR POSTBUCKLING

OPTIMISATION STRATEGIES

Francesco S. Liguori1 , Antonio Madeo1 , Leonardo Leonetti1 , Magisano Domenico1 ,

Garcea Giovanni1
1
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Informatica, Modellistica, Elettronica e Sistemistica, Università della
Calabria, Italy, francesco.liguori@unical.it

Key Words: Isogeometry, postbuckling, imperfection sensitivity, optimisation

The optimal design of shell structures undergoing buckling phenomena is nowadays an open problem,
whose solution would provide interesting answers to both academy and industry. The main difficulty is
represented by the high computational cost required for optimising a full-scale structure characterised
by a relatively complex postbuckling behaviour. Accordingly, the overall optimisation process requires
a high number of structural analyses to be performed.
This work is aimed at improving the efficiency of the evaluation of the postbuckling response of com-
posite shell structures undergoing buckling phenomena. To this end, an isogeometric model, based on
a solid-shell description, is proposed. Patch-wise reduced integration schemes, previously proposed for
the linear elastic case, are adopted and tested in the context of geometrical non-linearities to cure the
interpolation locking phenomena that affect the formulation. Therefore, the resulting formulation is al-
most locking-free and, additionally, the computational cost of the numerical integration is reduced with
respect to standard element-wise integration procedures. This displacement-based isogeometric model
is consequently accurate and efficient also for low-order NURBS interpolation and a mixed formulation
is not strictly required. However, as shown in many previous papers, a mixed formulation is necessary to
avoid a phenomenon known as extrapolation locking. To this end, a peculiar mixed formulation, called
Mixed Integration Point (MIP), is adopted.
Finally, on the basis of this discretised model, a multimodal Koiter’s method is formulated to solve the
equilibrium equations. It allows the computational cost of the solution to be reduced with respect to
path-following strategies through the construction of a reduced order model. In addition, the method
gives informations about the worst-case imperfection without increasing the computational cost of the
analysis of a perfect structure. The suitability of the proposed method to be included in optimisation
algorithms is shown by several numerical examples.

REFERENCES

[1] L. Leonetti, F. S. Liguori, D. Magisano and G. Garcea. An efficient isogeometric solid-shell for-
mulation for geometrically nonlinear analysis of elastic shells. Computer Methods in Applied Me-
chanics and Engineering (2018) 331:159—183.
[2] F. S. Liguori, G. Zucco, A. Madeo, D. Magisano, L. Leonetti, G. Garcea, and P. M. Weaver. Post-
buckling optimisation of a variable angle tow composite wingbox using a multi-modal Koiter ap-
proach. Thin-Walled Structures (2019) 138:183–198.