Buckling of thin-walled stiffened panels in transportation structures: benchmarking and parametric study

The increasingly frequent utilisation of aircraft across the globe significantly increases the likelihood of structural failures. One contributing factor to aviation accidents, as revealed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and Indonesian National Transportation Safety Committee (KNKT) investigation, is technical errors stemming from structural failures in aircraft. Buckling in thin-walled structures leads to a substantial increase in deformation and a subsequent reduction in load-bearing capacity. To address this, lightweight and high-strength stiffener panels are employed. This study focuses on investigating the buckling resistance of stiffened aircraft panel structures. The finite element method is utilised to numerically simulate and analyse the stiffened panels under predetermined boundary conditions. Three main types of variations are considered: (i) stiffener type within the controlled volume, (ii) number and spacing of stiffeners in the panel, and (iii) stiffener configuration. The adopted material for the stiffener panels is 2024-T3 aluminium alloy, with panel geometry resembling that of a reference model. The findings demonstrate that adopting a Y-shaped stiffener geometry, incorporating transverse stiffeners, and reducing the distance between stiffeners enhance the buckling resistance and collapse performance of the stiffened panel structure.