LARGE DEFLECTIONS OF ORTHOTROPIC PLATES.

The paper deals with the large deflection behavior of homogeneous orthotropic plates subjected to unidirectional loading. The membrane boundary conditions give stress free unloaded edges while the loaded ends are assumed to have a constant inplane displacement. On the unloaded edges both rotationally restrained and free edges are considered for the flexural boundary conditions, while the loaded ends are simply supported. A semi energy method is used in the analysis employing both the von Karman type large deflection equation and the theorem of minimum total potential energy.