ABSTRACT
The objective of this work is to develop a new approximate solution to study the large deflection behaviour of rectangular plates accounting for the geometric and material nonlinearities. The principle of the virtual work and rigid plastic solution are used to predict the plate pre-collapse and post-collapse responses, respectively. The newly developed model predicts the post-collapse response of rectangular plates using the roof mode plastic solution. Displacement and stresses as predicted by the new approximate solution are compared with the nonlinear finite element solution employing the commercial software ANSYS.
