Empirical formulations for estimation of ultimate strength of continuous aluminium stiffened plates under combined transverse compression and lateral pressure

Abstract

Empirical expressions are developed for predicting ultimate compressive strength of welded aluminium stiffened plates used in marine applications under combined transverse in-plane compression and different levels of lateral pressure. A database of the ultimate transverse strengths for aluminium stiffened plates numerically obtained by the authors is used for deriving formulations as functions of two parameters, namely the plate slenderness ratio and the column (stiffener) slenderness ratio. Regression analysis is used in order to derive the empirical formulations. The formulae implicitly include the effects of the weld on the initial imperfections and the heat-affected zone.

Keywords:

• ultimate strength
• continuous aluminium stiffened plates
• transverse compression
• lateral pressure
• empirical formulation
• heat-affected zone
• finite element method (FEM)
• regression analysis