Alternative approach for imperfection-tolerant design optimization of stiffened cylindrical shells via energy barrier method

Imperfection sensitivity analysis of stiffened shells generally involves high computational cost, thus imperfection-tolerant design is a challenging issue. The concept of using the energy barrier to predict the buckling load of imperfect cylindrical shells has exhibited potential for practical application. In this study, the energy barrier method is used for stiffened cylindrical shells to obtain the minimum post-buckling load, and the numerical-based smeared stiffener method (NSSM) is employed to accelerate the analysis process. Then, an imperfection-tolerant design optimization framework for stiffened cylindrical shells is established via energy barrier method. Results show that the design configuration of a stiffened cylindrical shell with higher imperfection tolerance capacity can be obtained by the proposed method in a more efficient manner.