A Novel Approach for Lateral Buckling Assessment of Double Tapered Thin-Walled Laminated Composite I-Beams

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a simple and novel method for discussing the lateral-torsional stability of thin-walled symmetric balanced laminated beams with varying I-section. Based on the classic lamination theory and Vlasov‘s model, the total potential energy for the flexural displacements and the twist angle is established. The variational formulation is then constructed only in terms of the angle of twist using an auxiliary function. The buckling loads are finally determined by applying the Ritz method. To demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed formulation, the analytical solutions for a sample case of tapered I-beam are compared with results obtained from ANSYS's shell element. Moreover, this new procedure is very efficient in reducing the computational effort. Eventually, based on a selected load, the influences of some parameters such as the tapering ratios, transverse load position, and fiber orientation on lateral stability resistance of composite tapered I-beams under simply supported end conditions are discussed in detail. The results show that the lateral buckling resistance of composite beam with tapered I-section decreases significantly as the fiber angle in both flanges is rotated off-axis. Also, the maximum lateral buckling load for simply supported web and flanges tapered beam under uniformly distributed load is obtained by placing fibersin the web and  in both flanges.