ABSTRACT
Single layer space structures are often used in moderate span buildings, sport halls and exhibition centers (Sadegi 2004). As these structures have less bending stiffness, a sizable amount of work has been dedicated to assess the buckling behaviour of single layer space structures. Issues such as investigating the static stability of space structures using genetic algorithm (EI-Lishani et al. 2005), estimation of buckling loads of Elliptic Parabloidal single layer lattice domes under vertical loads (Kato et al. 2006) and optimization for maximum buckling load of a lattice space frame with non-linear sensitivity analysis have been thoroughly investigated (Chen et al. 2006). However there is still an uncertainty at the time of performing the buckling analysis of single layer dome form of space structures. The reason is that the approximate design criteria for buckling analysis established by the different codes are generally applicable to planner frames, but uncertain for space structures. In the present paper the criteria of the general buckling, local buckling and the member buckling are given in a simple form that are found to be function of a geometric characteristic parameter of a dome. Furthermore numerical and experimental studies of the buckling behaviour of geodesic and reticulated dome form of space structures have been carried out. In these studies, the geometrical nonlinearity due to large displacements could be included. The results of linear and non-linear buckling analysis
have been compared by finite element method and the relation of buckling load of geodesic and reticulated domes has been revealed through these studies. In order to arrive to these goals, the mathematical model of the structures must be selected, that sufficiently be able to show the act of the real model. Therefore, the geometrical modeling of structures has been performed using the written software by the researchers and coordinates of dome’s joints have been gained.
