Stress and buckling of nonuniformly heated cylindrical and conical shells.

A computer program for the stress and stability analysis of segmented, ring-stiffened shells of revolution is used to calculate thermal stress and buckling of nonuniformly heated monocoque cones and ring-stiffened cylinders. Comparisons between test and theory are given for stress and buckling of nonuniformly axially compressed and heated ring-stiffened cylinders and cylinders and cones heated along axial strips. Particular attention is given to the effect of boundary conditions on predicted stress and critical temperatures. It is found that predicted buckling temperatures are not sensitive to width of heated strip even for very narrow strips. However, agreement between test and theory improves as the heated strip becomes narrower, presumably because large imperfections are less likely to occur within the thermally stressed portions of the shells where buckling occurs.