A Study on the Optimization of the Natural Frequency of a Ring-Stiffened Cylindrical Shell

For the optimization of the fundamental natural frequency of stiffened cylindrical shells, simulations were performed for cylindrical shells that were stiffened with between one and five ring stiffeners. ANSYS 11.0 was used to simulate the optimization for the natural frequency. The Subproblem Approximation Method was applied as the optimization method. The design function of the optimization was the geometry of the T-shaped ring stiffener, and the constraint function was the maximum additional volume, constrained to a 10% increase. The objective function of the optimization was chosen to maximize the fundamental natural frequency. The performance index for optimal design was defined as the ratio of the natural frequency to the volume of the unstiffened and stiffened shells. The optimal performance index was obtained for the shell stiffened with three rings.