Instability of cylindrical panels under combined static and dynamic loads

This paper presents a numerical study of the dynamic snap-through instability of cylindrical panels subjected to the combined loading of uniform pressure and a central concentrated load. All static and dynamic (sudden step load) combinations of the concentrated load and the uniform pressure are considered. The characteristics of the dynamic instability of the panel are described for the two cases of static pressure with dynamic concentrated load and dynamic pressure with static concentrated load. The critical load curves for both cases are presented. To explain the effects of the initial static loads on the critical dynamic loads, the static and dynamic critical loads corresponding to both static loads or both dynamic loads are also calculated. The Budiansky-Roth criterion is employed in all these studies to determine the critical dynamic loads. The numerical results show that the static critical load curve gives an upper-bound whereas the dynamic critical load curve offers a lower-bound. Both the compound critical load curves lie between the static and dynamic critical load curves.