An investigation of the effects of shear on the deflection of an orthotropic cantilever beam by the use of anisotropic elasticity theory

Abstract Two deflection functions due to both flexure and shear of an orthotropic cantilever beam subjected to both point and distributed loads have been obtained by the use of anisotropic elasticity theory. The deflections at the free end of the beam are calculated in order to see the effect of shear by using the obtained functions for different materials and fiber directions. In particular, when the cross-sectional height to beam-length ratio is equal to or greater than 0.25 or when the fiber directions are 0 and 90°, the results show that ignoring shear effects causes significant error level in the deflections.