Laminated composite plates subject to thermal load using trigonometrical theory based on Carrera Unified Formulation

In the present work, an analytical solution for the thermoelastic static problem of simply supported laminated composite plates is presented. The present mathematical model uses a unified new trigonometric displacement field expansion under Carrera Unified Formulation (CUF). The equivalent single layer (ESL) governing equations are written using CUF notation for static thermal stress analysis employing the Principle of Virtual Displacement (PVD). The highly coupled partial differential equations are solved using Navier solution method. Normalized and non-normalized unified trigonometric shear strain shape functions are introduced for the first time. Shear deformation results are compared with the classical polynomial ones, which is usually adopted in several refined plate theories under CUF. Linear temperature profile and non-linear temperature profile obtained by solving heat conduction problem are taken into account. Good agreements with 3D solution for several order of expansion are reached, but instabilities are shown for some particular order of expansion even when an exact through the thickness integration technique was adopted. Similar values are presented between polynomial and non-polynomial displacement fields. However, non-polynomial functions can be optimized by changing the arguments of such functions in order to improve the results. Future studies are necessary in this direction. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.