Thermo-elastic/plastic semi-analytical solution of incompressible functionally graded spherical pressure vessel under thermo-mechanical loading (Q645342)

This paper presents a comprehensive thermo-elastic/plastic semi-analytical solution of a spherical pressure vessel made of incompressible functionally graded materials (FGM) under thermo-mechanical loading. The modulus of elasticity of the material is assumed to vary nonlinearly in the radial direction, and axisymmetric displacements and stresses in the functionally graded (FG) spherical vessel subjected to thermal loading and uniform internal pressure are determined using the plasticity theory. Tresca's yield criterion and its associated flow rule are used to formulate different plastic regions for an ideal FGM. In this way, the material property varies by Young's modulus that may be an arbitrary function of the radial coordinate. Therefore, the material is assumed to be functionally graded in the radial direction. Because general analytical solutions of such equations are not available, a numerical method (semi-analytical) is applied, and a new collection of equilibrium equations with small deflections is presented. Accordingly, the radial domain is divided into some virtual sub-domains in which the power-law distribution is used for thermomechanical properties (including the modulus of elasticity, yield stress limit, coefficient of thermal conductivity, and coefficient of thermal expansion although the Poisson ratio is assumed to be constant) of the elemental components. By considering the necessary continuity conditions between adjacent sub-domains, jointly with the global boundary conditions, the authors obtain a set of linear differential equations for the problem of steady-state heat conduction and for the corresponding thermoelastic problem. The solution to the linear differential equations yields the thermoelastic responses for each sub-domain as exponential functions of the radial coordinate. The authors study the effects of a radial gradation of the constitutive components on the stress, the strain, and the displacement components of FG spheres along the radius in the elastic and plastic area under different mechanical and thermal conditions. The results show, contrary to the well-known elastic/plastic deformation behavior of a spherical pressure vessel, that an FGM spherical vessel may deform in entirely different ways. Plastic deformation may commence at the outer surface or even simultaneously at both surfaces. The authors demonstrate that for a given pair of materials, there is a particular volume fraction that extremizes a specified mechanical response under a given loading. From the results, it is noted that the gradation of the constitutive components plays an important role in determining the thermo-mechanical responses of FGM spheres as well as in the optimal design of this structure.