Flexural-torsional buckling of arches under directed or hydrostatic loads

Publisher Summary The chapter describes the use an energy approach to study the elastic flexural-torsional buckling of circular arches of doubly symmetric cross-section under uniform compression produced by hydrostatic or uniformly distributed directed radial loads. Closed form solutions for the buckling loads under these loading conditions are obtained in the chapter. It is found that the buckling load under hydrostatic uniform radial loads is highest while the buckling load under conservative uniform radial loads is the lowest. The lateral components of uniformly distributed radial loads that are always directed to the centre of the initial curvature of an arch and of hydrostatic loads increase the flexural-torsional buckling resistance of the arch under uniform compression.