NJSTR 05 26 2022
NJSTR 05 26 2022
NJSTR 05 26 2022
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N. Enoma, J. Madu*
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Benin, Benin City, Nigeria
1. Introduction
Elastic shell theories and the geometry of toroidal shells are relatively complicated when compared
with traditional shells used in engineering applications [1]. Closed toroidal shells are employed in
space, nuclear and under-water fields, where buckling may be prevalent depending on the mode of
loading. Some results for the buckling of toroidal shells of have been presented by [2], where focus
was on toroids with elliptical cross-section subjected to internal pressure. The buckling response of
liquid-filled barrel shells has been presented [3], while [4] examined the buckling behaviour of
vessels supported by using two saddles. In [5], the comparison of numerical programs BOSOR 5
(which employed variational finite differences technique) [6] and INCA [7] for computing the
buckling toroidal shells was carried out, where the two programs gave buckling pressures which
agree within 6% for prolate elliptical toroids. [8] worked on the plastic buckling pressures of various
internally pressurized toroidal shells of elliptical cross section. It noted that the buckling pressure
was approximately equal to their elastic counterparts, when the major-to-minor axis ratio is equal
to 2.5. The buckling performance of multi-segment pressure subjected to uniform hydrostatic
pressure was discussed by [9], in which the experimental and numerical collapse pressure yielded
similar results.
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The present paper numerically analyses the buckling behaviour of a novel toroidal vessel with
circular-elliptical cross-section under external pressure loading, including the buckling response of
the vessel due to changes in the cross-sectional geometrical parameters. The sketch of the non-
conventional toroidal vessel is shown in Figure 1 with the loading and geometrical parameters. The
vessel consists of a top semi-circular toroidal segment that is joined tangentially to a bottom semi-
o i
elliptical segment at their equatorial circles of latitude (at D in the outer region and D in the inner
region of the vessel). Consequently, the total height of the vessel is a + b , where a is the local
radius and the local (horizontal) semi-axis of the semi-circular and semi-elliptic toroidal segments,
respectively, and b is the local (vertical) semi-axis of the semi-elliptic segment. The toroidal mean
radius of the vessel is denoted by A and the entire external surface of the vessel is subjected to a
uniform pressure, which is denoted by a patch pressure load p in Figure 1.
Y A
a a
Do Di Di Do
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0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
CL
A
Initial
shape
Figure 2 (a): SAX2 first axisymmetric buckling mode for a toroid with b / a = 3.0 , A / a = 2.0 ,
a / t = 200
Figure 2 (b): S4R first buckling mode for a toroid with b / a = 3.0 , A / a = 2.0 , a / t = 200 , n = 27
The magnitude of each of the first buckling pressures obtained from the two approaches is given in
Table 2. It is noticed that, for this example, the first eigenvalue obtained from the axisymmetric
model (SAX2) is over three times larger than that from the full model (S4R). This is an indication
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that the lowest buckling mode of the pressurised vessel is asymmetrical about the global axis Y − Y
of the vessel, as seen in Figure 2 (b). Hence, the critical buckling pressure of interest is
pcr = 0.160MPa , (the first eigenvalue obtained from the S4R model for this case), as shown in
Table 2.
Table 2: Comparison of buckling pressures from SAX2 and S4R shell models
p( MPa)
b/a A/a a/t
SAX2 S4R pcr
3.0 2.0 200 0.252 0.160 0.160
The critical buckling pressure was then used in the nonlinear static Riks analysis of the pressurised
vessel. The program was set to terminate after 400 increments, and 0.4, 10-6 and 0.4 initial, minimum
and maximum arc length increments. A typical load-deflection curve obtained for the toroidal vessel
with b / a = 3.0 , A / a = 2.0 , a / t = 200 is shown in Figure 3, where the variation in the external
pressure to critical buckling pressure ratio ( p / pcr ) is plotted against the vertical displacement of
the lowest circle of latitude (nadir) per shell thickness (y / t ) .
1.6
[0.245𝑀𝑃𝑎]
1.4
𝑝𝑐𝑜𝑙 (collapse point)
1.2
𝑝𝑐𝑟 (bifurcation point)
1
[0.160𝑀𝑃𝑎]
0.8
𝑝
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
0.00 0.89 2.08 3.39 4.83 6.37
∆𝑦/𝑡
Figure 3: The plot of external pressure versus nadir deflection for a toroid with b / a = 3.0 ,
A / a = 2.0 , a / t = 200
As seen in Figure 3, the bifurcation buckling is initiated in the zone with the least stiffness mainly
as a result of relatively large values of the principal radius of curvature r1 spanning through a wide
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spectrum of the meridional profile on the positive Gaussian side of the vessel where the failure
started. The span of the meridional spectrum with large values of r1 is a function of b / a ratio. In
the meridional span under discussion, is around and for b / a 1 , the angle changes very
slowly as one move away from the equator of the semi-elliptical segment. This results in a wider
meridional span with large values of r1 . The value of b / a from which the present toroidal vessel
starts to fail in a non-symmetric mode by bifurcation buckling.
To be able to validate the results, an extreme case of the present circular-elliptical toroidal vessel,
where b = a is used. Hence, the vessel reduces to a circular toroid, which has readily available
results for buckling in the literature. For ease of comparison, linear eigenvalue analyses were
conducted on a set of circular toroids with geometrical parameters adopted from [2], in which the
buckling pressures were calculated using the French finite element program, INCA. The critical
buckling results obtained from the present FEM approach are compared with those from the studies
by Sobel & Flügge [12], Wang & Zhang [13], and Galletly & Błachut [2] in Table 3. It could be
seen that the obtained numerical results in the last column are almost identical to the results obtained
from the French finite element program, INCA by Galletly & Błachut, and also compare very well
with the results from the studies by Sobel & Flügge, Wang & Zhang.
Table 3: Comparison of critical buckling pressures for perfect circular toroidal shells under
uniform external pressure.
pcr (MPa)
3. Parametric study
A wide range of geometric parameters of the circular-elliptical toroidal vessel was systematically
selected and considered in this section to investigate the influence of the toroidal cross-sectional
height to width ratio, opening ratio, and thickness ratio on the bifurcation and collapse behaviour of
the toroidal assemblies, as reported in the following:
3.1. Effects of the toroidal cross-sectional height-to-width ratios
Using the Abaqus finite element code, eigenvalue buckling and nonlinear Riks static analyses were
conducted on circular-elliptical toroidal vessels under uniform external pressure with S4R shell
models. The b / a ratios are 0.5, 0.75, 1, 2, 3, and 4 as shown with the other geometric parameters
and corresponding failure values in Table 4, where the numbers in brackets denote the number of
circumferential waves developed at the bifurcation.
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Table 4: Bifurcation pressure, pbif and collapse pressure, pcol for externally pressurised toroidal
vessels with various values of b / a .
p (MPa)
b/a A/ a a/t
pbif pcol pcr
0.5 2.0 200 - 0.0601 0.0601
0.75 2.0 200 - 0.0843 0.0843
1.0 2.0 200 0.1068(0) 0.4383 0.1068
2.0 2.0 200 - 0.1848 0.1848
3.0 2.0 200 0.1603(27) 0.2434 0.1603
4.0 2.0 200 0.0918(22) 0.1931 0.0918
In Table 4, it is noticed that for some values of b / a ratios, the pressurised vessels did not fail by
asymmetric bifurcation. Interestingly, within this range of values of b / a , a vessel with b / a = 1
(which is, of course, a complete circular toroidal vessel) is found to bifurcate with n = 0
circumferential waves. This externally pressurised vessel is seen to have a very stable post-buckling
state as the final collapse pressure pcol of the vessel is over four times higher than the bifurcation
buckling pressures of 0.1068MPa . This is the highest collapse pressure to bifurcation pressure ratio
obtained for the various b / a studied.
In the last column of Table 4, one would note that as b / a increases from 0.5, the critical pressure
pcr increases steadily until the highest value is attained before reducing steadily. The increase in
the values of pcr as b / a increases is seen among the relatively short vessels with characteristic first
failure modes that are not asymmetric. For the taller vessels, the values of pcr decrease as b / a
increase. The critical failure mode for these tall vessels is asymmetric about the principal axis of
revolution of the vessels.
0.30
A/a=1.5
0.25 A/a=2.0
A/a=4.0
𝑝𝑐𝑟 (𝑀𝑃
0.20
𝑎)
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.00
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 4.0 4.5
b/𝑎
Figure 4: Critical buckling pressure versus b / a ratio for different toroidal opening ratios
To get a clearer picture of the vessels to be called ‘short’ or ‘tall’ vessels, changes in b / a were
investigated with different values of the toroidal opening ratios A / a . The values of A / a
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considered are relatively for compact ( A / a = 1.5) , medium ( A / a = 2.0) and large diameter
( A / a = 4.0) geometries of the circular-elliptic toroidal vessel, while the b / a value was varied from
0.5 to 4.0, and the thickness ratio a / t , support conditions applied only to the inner-most equator
and material properties remained the same as before. The critical buckling pressures for the various
b / a ratios are shown in Figure 4.
For the different values of A / a , results in Figure 4 show that the critical buckling pressure of the
vessels increases steadily until a peak value is reached before reducing as b / a increases from 0, as
seen before in Table 4. Hence, as far as first buckling pressure is concern, Figure 4 indicates that
toroidal vessels of the type under present investigation are stronger (with peak critical buckling
values) if the value of b / a is around 2.5 for a / t = 200 . However, as mentioned in Section 4.1, the
highest collapse pressure of all b / a ratios studied was obtained for circular toroids (b / a = 1.0) .
It is also observed that there are distinctly different critical buckling modes corresponding to the
toroidal vessels on both sides of the peak pressure value in Figure 4. For a / t = 200 , the critical
buckling modes for toroidal geometries with b / a up to 2.5 are axisymmetrical about the global
axis of revolution of the toroids with zero circumferential wave number (n = 0) , while those after
b / a = 2.5 are not symmetrical about the global axis of revolution of the toroids with corresponding
circumferential wave number that is always greater than zero (n 0) . This transition from buckling
mode with n = 0 to that of n 0 is seen not be a function of A / a . Typical examples of these
distinctive buckling modes and their corresponding sectional views are depicted in Figure 5 for each
of the indicated circular-elliptic toroidal geometries.
Figure 5(a): View of axisymmetric bifurcation buckling mode for a short toroid with b / a = 1 ,
A / a = 2 , a / t = 200 , n = 0 , pcr = 0.108MPa
The effects of change in toroidal opening ratios on buckling pressures could be seen in Figure 4,
where results of critical buckling pressures calculated for different values of A / a are shown. It is
observed that the failure pressure of a circular-elliptic toroidal vessel greatly depends on the
compactness of the vessel. For the three A / a values, i.e. 1.5, 2, and 4 studied, the critical pressure
values of the vessels generally reduce in that order. It shows that higher failure pressures are
associated with ‘compact’ vessels when compared to corresponding vessels with larger opening
A / a ratios.
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CL
A
Initial
shape
B Section B-B
Figure 5(b): View of asymmetric bifurcation buckling mode for a tall toroid with b / a = 3.0 ,
A / a = 4 , a / t = 200 , n = 45 , pcr = 0.093MPa
The rate at which the buckling pressure changes with A / a was investigated for various circular-
elliptic toroidal geometries. Constant values of b / a = 2 and a / t = 200 were adopted, and the
toroidal opening A / a ratio was varied from 1.25 to 16. The vessels were modelled in Abaqus with
S4R shell elements by adopting the mesh densities, boundary constraints, and elastic material
properties of the previous examples.
Eigenvalue and nonlinear static analyses were conducted on perfect toroidal vessels and the critical
pressure values for the different toroidal opening ratios were recorded and plotted in Figure 6. The
plot shows that critical pressure value of the pressurised vessels reduces rapidly as the opening ratio
A / a increases to 4 approximately, and then steadily until A / a reaches around 9, after which the
critical pressure value then reduces slowly, so that the behaviour of the vessel will be identical to
that of a long cylindrical shell, as A / a → .
0.25
0.20
0.15
𝑝𝑐𝑟
(𝑀
0.10
0.05
0.00
0 3 6 9 12 15
𝐴/𝑎
Figure 6: Critical buckling against A / a for toroids with b / a = 2 , a / t = 200
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4.5
4.0
3.5
3.0
a/t=50
2.5
a/t=100
/𝑝𝑐𝑟
𝑝
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
0.0
0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6
∆𝑦/𝑡
Figure 7: Plot of external pressures against nadir deflection for circular-elliptic toroids with
different a / t values.
Table 5: Bifurcation and collapse pressures of externally pressurised circular-elliptical toroids with
different a / t values.
The position of the bifurcation pressure pbif and the axisymmetric collapse pressure pcol are
indicated in Figure 7. The magnitudes of these pressure loads are given in Table 5. As expected, it
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is seen that both bifurcation and axisymmetric collapse pressures of the toroidal vessel reduce as the
thickness ratio a / t increases. That is, as the wall thickness t increases, the failure pressure of the
vessel increases.
The rate at which the buckling pressure changes with a / t was also investigated for various circular-
elliptic toroidal geometries with three different values of b / a and a single value of A / a = 2.0 . The
toroidal thickness ratio a / t was varied from 50 to 500. The idealization employed in the modelling
of the perfect vessels, including the support conditions and material properties are the same as
above. Eigenvalue and nonlinear static analyses were used for the calculation of pressure values in
Abaqus, and the critical pressure values for the different values of b / a obtained are plotted against
the toroidal thickness ratio a / t in Figure 8. The plot shows that critical pressure values of the
pressurised vessels reduce spontaneously as a / t increases to 140 approximately, and then reduces
slowly afterwards.
3
b/a=0.5
b/a=1
2.5 b/a=3
2
𝑝𝑐𝑟 (𝑀𝑃𝑎)
1.5
0.5
0
0 100 200 300 400 500
𝑎/𝑡
Figure 8: Plot of external pressures versus thickness ratios a / t for toroids with different b / a
values
4. Conclusion
The buckling behaviour of a novel toroidal vessel with circular-elliptical cross-section under external
pressure loading has been numerically studied in this paper, including the buckling response of the
vessel due to changes in the cross-sectional geometrical parameters. It is seen that the vessel
generally has a stable post-buckling behaviour and may, therefore, be able to resist further load
beyond the elastic bifurcation loads. The buckling shape or weakest zone where the buckling
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