An experimental investigation on interactive behavior of thin walled cylindrical shells

Cylindrical shells are widely used in many kinds of applications under different cases of load combination. Nevertheless, only a small number of researches have been executed on cylindrical shells under pure bending in combination with external pressure. The present experimental research studies the buckling behavior of long cylindrical steel shells under combined pure bending and peripheral pressure. This study shows that initial sectional deformation developed by preloading considerably affects the buckling capacity of such shells. Moreover, it was found that primary load appreciably expedites the initiation of the buckling by activating the possible geometrical imperfections once shells are exposed to secondary load.