Cylindrical shells enabling most advanced specificstiffness/strength designs for structural components inaerospace applications. Currently, imperfectionsensitive shell structures prone to buckling are designedaccording to the NASA SP-8007 guideline [1], from1968, using its conservative lower bound curve. In thisguideline the structural behaviour of compositematerials is not appropriately considered, since theimperfection sensitivity and the buckling load of shellsmade of advanced composites materials depend on thelay-up design. The most critical aspect for numericalbuckling prediction is the structure’s sensitivity togeometric and loading imperfections. A Europeanproject DESICOS [2] (New Robust DESign Guidelinefor Imperfection Sensitive COmposite LauncherStructures) is working on new methodologies toestimate the ultimate load of such structures. In thiscontext an experimental buckling characterisation of acomposite cylinder with three eccentric supports will beoutlined. The study involves assessment of straindistribution correlating with various load introductioncases.
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