A new triangular shell element for composites accounting for shear deformation

Abstract In this paper, we propose an efficient 3-node shell element with 6 DOFs per node based on Naghdi-Reissner-Mindlin theory. This new composite shell element, further denoted as DKMT18, takes into account shear deformation and coupled bending-membrane energy. DKMT18 element passes membrane, bending, and shear patch tests with no spurious mode. It also performs successfully in standard tests for thick and thin shells problems without membrane or shear locking. The proposed shell element is capable of dealing with composite laminated shell structures. The computed results by the DKMT18 element converge more rapidly towards the reference solution compared to any state of-the-art shell element.