FLEXURAL ANALYSIS OF COMPOSITE LAMINATED BEAMS SUBJECTED TO THERMO-MECHANICAL LOADS

The present work is concerned with the flexural analysis of single layer orthotropic, two-layer antisymmetric and three-layer symmetric laminated beams subjected to uniformly distributed thermo-mechanical loads. The thermal load is varying linearly across the thickness of laminated beams. A combination of uniformly distributed thermal load with uniformly distributed transverse mechanical load is taken into consideration for the flexural analysis of laminated beams. A sinusoidal shear deformation theory is used. The displacement field of theory consists of sinusoidal function in terms of thickness co-ordinate to include the shear deformation effect. Governing equations and boundary conditions of theory are obtained by using the principal of virtual work. The theory obviates the need of shear correction factor and satisfies the shear stress free conditions at the top and bottom of the beam. Stresses and displacements in orthotropic, antisymmetric and symmetric cross ply laminated beams are obtained by using sinusoidal shear deformation theory. The results obtained by present theory are compared with Timoshenko beam theory, classical beam theory and also with the results which are available in the literature wherever possible.