Deformations in Composite Shells of Revolution under Axisymmetric and Thermal Loads

Numerous papers have been published dealing with stresses and deforma tions in composite cylinders. However, none of them included thermoelastic analysis and spherical geometry. In the present paper, deformations in balanced laminated shells of rev olution subjected to internal pressure and thermal loads were studied using the membrane theory. The results for a special case of spherical shells show that membrane theory is sufficient in predicting the deformed shapes of laminated shells with identical axial and transverse stiffnesses, which are common in many engineering applications. Deformations in laminates with different axial and transverse stiffnesses become unbounded at the poles which indicate that, for such class of laminates, the stress buildup at the tip point cannot be balanced by membrane forces alone.