Buckling and strain response of a filament winding composite cylindrical shell subjected to hydrostatic pressure: Analytical solution and testing

In the present work, an analytical solution for buckling load prediction was presented for the analysis of a composite cylinder manufactured by filament winding. A cylinder were produced using T700-12K carbon/epoxy towpreg and subjected to an external hydrostatic load testing. The strain and buckling responses were monitored until the cylinder collapsed. The relationship between strain responses and crack propagation path were investigated. Compared with the experimental data, the analytical solution predicted the critical buckling pressure with an error of only 1.04%. Furthermore, the buckling mode obtained by the numerical analysis was in good agreement with experimental strain measurements. Hydrostatic test result demonstrated that the composite shell did not lose its load carrying capacity immediately at buckling occurrence. Instead, it was observed that the collapse pressure were 13.04% higher than the buckling pressure in this study.