Non-linear bending of shear deformable laminated plates under lateral pressure and thermal loading and resting on elastic foundations

A non-linear bending analysis is presented for a simply supported shear deformable composite laminated plate subjected to a combined uniform lateral pressure and thermal loading and resting on a two-parameter (Pasternak-type) elastic foundation. The formulations are based on Reddy's higher-order shear deformation plate theory, including the plate-foundation interaction and thermal effects. The analysis uses a mixed Galerkin-perturbation technique to determine the load-deflection curves and load-bending moment curves. Numerical examples are presented that relate to the performances of antisymmetric angle-ply and symmetric cross-ply laminated plates subjected to thermomechanical loading and resting on two-parameter elastic foundations from which results for Winkler elastic foundations are obtained as a limiting case. The influences due to a number of effects e.g. foundation stiffness, plate aspect ratio, total number of plies, fibre orientation and initial thermal bending stress, are studied. Typical results are presented in a dimensionless graphical form.