Abstract:
Filament wound composite pressure vessels have been used in aerospace applications
since long and in recent past this technology has been adopted for the development of
commercial products such as pressure vessels, pipes, sporting goods and high strength
products of mostly axi-symmetric profiles. Attributed to the manufacturing technology
from which these products are developed, special design schemes and theories have been
devised for the design purposes. Pressure vessels are one of these products which are
designed with special attention to the filament winding process. Cylindrical pressure
vessels consist of a cylindrical portion and dome regions (end caps). A proper design
would require a structure of uniform strength with loads evenly distributed in the dome
region. The dome regions require that along their contours, stresses remain constant and
hence derive their name isotensoid. The most common design theory comes from Netting
Analysis procedure in which it is assumed that only fibers carry the loads. This procedure
is easy and simple to use but shows a decrease in volume of the dome region and an
increase in structural weight compared to a technique derived from optimal design
concept. A comparative study for both netting analysis and optimal design procedures is
presented and a trial design is then calculated and analyzed in ANSYS. Special attention
is given to the dome region where stress field varies with varying winding angles. The
dome profile though was designed with monotropic property but after analyzing the
structure in ANSYS it was observed that with transversely isotropic assignment, the
dome still exhibited isotensoid behavior. The dome contours are classified as ellipsoid
and hence elliptic integrals were used for generation of dome profiles. These profiles
produced domes with varying thicknesses and wind angles
