Ultimate Strength Analysis of Cracked Stiffened Plates Under Uniaxial Compression Loads

Mechanical properties of cracked stiffened plates under uniaxial compression loads were studied.The ultimate strength reduction of stiffened plates due to different sizes and locations of the cracks were investigated.A series of nonlinear finite element analyses for cracked stiffened plates under uniaxial compression loads were carried out by software Abaqus.Then the mechanical characteristics and failure modes are presented.It is shown that the ultimate strength of stiffened plates can be reduced due to the cracks,and the ultimate strength will be sharply decreased when crack sizes exceed critical values.