Decay rate of edge effects in cross-ply-laminated hollow cylinders

The decay rates of stresses and displacements due to self-equilibrated loads acting on the end of cross-ply-laminated hollow cylinders are found by using the theory of three-dimensional elasticity. The study assumes that the periodic displacement and stresses fields used decay away exponentially from the end load region. The use of a recursive and successive approximation method leads to an eigenmatrix whose eigenvalues represent the decay rates of the problem. By this approach, the composite cylinders may be composed of an arbitrary number of orthotropic layers, each of which may have different material properties and thicknesses. The eigenvalue problem has always a dimension of 3×3, regardless of the number of the layers. The decay rates for either symmetric or antisymmetric cross-ply-laminated cylinders are found and presented. The effects of material properties on decay rates are investigated for a typical eight-layered anti-symmetric cross-ply-laminated cylinder. The displacement and stress distributions across thickness of cylinders for selected problems are also presented.