Geometrically nonlinear analysis of laminated composites by an improved degenerated shell element

The objective of this paper is to extend the use of the improved degenerated shell element to the linear and the large displacement analysis of plates and shells with laminated composites. In the formulation of the element stiffness, the combined use of three different techniques was made. This element is free of serious shear/membrane locking problems and undesirable compatible/commutable spurious kinematic deformation modes. The total Lagrangian approach has been utilized for the definition of the deformation and the solution to the nonlinear equilibrium equations is obtained by the Newton-Raphson method. The applicability and accuracy of this improved degenerated shell element in the analysis of laminated composite plates and shells are demonstrated by solving several numerical examples.