Influence of geometric imperfections and lamination defects on the buckling behaviour of composite cylinders

The buckling behaviour of composite cylinders is highly influenced by the presence of geometric imperfections and other factors that can cause big discrepancies between experimental loads and analytical values. The influence of the geometric imperfections has been widely analysed in steel shells and only recently it has been tackled also for composite shells. In this work the effects of geometric imperfections and other defects due to the manufacturing process, like the thickness variations or possible misalignments of the fibers from the nominal directions, are analysed with the objective of producing relevant suggestions for the designers. The research is aimed at providing scientific background for a better exploitation of the material properties and defining the influence of the processing conditions on the product performance.