Are measurements of geometric imperfections of plates and shells useful?

摘要

This paper refers to the question whether it would be advantageous to make numerous measurements of geometric imperfections of shells. Measurements are presented of the geometric imperfections of sixteen flat plates of box columns and are compared with the effective imperfections of those plates during postbuckling; the two are not found to agree always. Therefore, the paper wishes to raise the question whether, for a program of imperfection measurements to be useful, it should not concentrate on effective imperfections.