Nonlinear stability analysis of stiffened functionally graded material sandwich cylindrical shells with general Sigmoid law and power law in thermal environment using third-order shear deformation theory

This paper investigates analytically nonlinear buckling and postbuckling of functionally graded sandwich circular thick cylindrical shells filled inside by Pasternak two-parameter elastic foundations under thermal loads and axial compression loads. Shells are reinforced by closely spaced functionally graded material (FGM) rings and stringers. The temperature field is taken into account. Two general Sigmoid law and general power law, with four models of stiffened FGM sandwich cylindrical shell, are proposed. Using the Reddy’s third-order shear deformation shell theory (TSDT), stress function, and Lekhnitsky’s smeared stiffeners technique, the governing equations are derived. The closed form to determine critical axial load and postbuckling load-deflection curves are obtained by the Galerkin method. The effects of the face sheet thickness to total thickness ratio, stiffener, foundation, material, and dimensional parameters on critical thermal loads, critical mechanical loads and postbuckling behavior of shells are analyzed. In addition, this paper shows that for thin shells we can use the classical shell theory to investigate stability behavior of shell, but for thicker shells the use of TSDT for analyzing nonlinear stability of shell is necessary and suitable.