In science, buckling is a mathematical instability, leading to a failure mode.

Theoretically, buckling is caused by abifurcation in the solution to the equations of static equilibrium. At a certain stage under an increasing load, further load is able to be sustained in one of two states of equilibrium: an undeformed state or a laterally-deformed state. In practice, buckling is characterized by a sudden failure of a structural member subjected to high compressive stress, where the actual compressive stress at the point of failure is less than the ultimate compressive stresses that the material is capable of withstanding. Mathematical analysis of buckling often makes use of an axial load eccentricity that introduces a secondary bending moment, which is not a part of the primary applied forces to which the member is subjected. As an applied load is increased on a member, such as column, it will ultimately become large enough to cause the member to become unstable and is said to have buckled. Further load will cause significant and somewhat unpredictable deformations, possibly leading to complete loss of the member's loadcarrying capacity. If the deformations that follow buckling are not catastrophic the member will continue to carry the load that caused it to buckle. If the buckled member is part of a larger assemblage of components such as a building, any load applied to the structure beyond that which caused the member to buckle will be redistributed within the structure.
Contents [hide] 1 Columns o 1.1 Self-buckling

2 Buckling under tensile dead loading 3 Constraints, curvature and multiple buckling 4 Flutter instability 5 Various forms of buckling 6 Bicycle wheels 7 Surface materials 8 Cause 9 Accidents 10 Energy method 11 Flexural-torsional buckling 12 Lateral-torsional buckling o 12.1 The modification factor (Cb)

13 Plastic buckling 14 Dynamic buckling

15 Buckling of thin cylindrical shells subject to axial loads 16 Buckling of pipes and pressure vessels subject to external overpressure 17 See also 18 References 19 External links

Columns[edit]

A column under a concentric axial load exhibiting the characteristic deformation of buckling

The eccentricity of the axial force results in a bending moment acting on the beam element.

The ratio of the effective length of a column to the least radius of gyration of its cross section is called the slenderness ratio (sometimes expressed with the Greek letter lambda, ). This ratio affords a means of classifying columns. Slenderness ratio is important for design considerations. All the following are approximate values used for convenience.

A short steel column is one whose slenderness ratio does not exceed 50; an intermediate length steel column has a slenderness ratio ranging from about 50 to 200, and are dominated by the strength limit of the material, while a long steel column may be assumed to have a slenderness ratio greater than 200 and its behavior is dominated by the modulus of elasticity of the material.

A short concrete column is one having a ratio of unsupported length to least dimension of the cross section equal to or less than 10. If the ratio is greater than 10, it is considered a long column (sometimes referred to as a slender column).

Timber columns may be classified as short columns if the ratio of the length to least dimension of the cross section is equal to or less than 10. The dividing line between intermediate and long timber columns cannot be readily evaluated. One way of defining the lower limit of long timber columns would be to set it as the smallest value of the ratio of length to least cross sectional area that would just exceed a certain constant K of the material. Since K depends on the modulus of elasticity and the allowable compressive stress parallel to the grain, it can be seen that this arbitrary limit would vary with the species of the timber. The value of K is given in most structural handbooks.

If the load on a column is applied through the center of gravity (centroid) of its cross section, it is called an axial load. A load at any other point in the cross section is known as an eccentric load. A short column under the action of an axial load will fail by direct compression before it buckles, but a long column loaded in the same manner will fail by buckling (bending), the buckling effect being so large that the effect of the axial load may be neglected. The intermediate-length column will fail by a combination of direct compressive stress and bending. In 1757, mathematician Leonhard Euler derived a formula that gives the maximum axial load that a long, slender, ideal column can carry without buckling. An ideal column is one that is perfectly straight, homogeneous, and free from initial stress. The maximum load, sometimes called the critical load, causes the column to be in a state of unstable equilibrium; that is, the introduction of the slightest lateral force will cause the column to fail by buckling. The formula derived by Euler for columns with no consideration for lateral forces is given below. However, if lateral forces are taken into consideration the value of critical load remains approximately the same.

where = maximum or critical force (vertical load on column), = modulus of elasticity, = area moment of inertia, = unsupported length of column, = column effective length factor, whose value depends on the conditions of end support of the column, as follows. For both ends pinned (hinged, free to rotate), = 1.0.

For both ends fixed,

= 0.50. = 0.699.... = 2.0.

For one end fixed and the other end pinned,

For one end fixed and the other end free to move laterally, is the effective length of the column.

Examination of this formula reveals the following interesting facts with regard to the load-bearing ability of slender columns. 1. Elasticity and not the compressive strength of the materials of the column determines the critical load. 2. The critical load is directly proportional to the second moment of area of the cross section. 3. The boundary conditions have a considerable effect on the critical load of slender columns. The boundary conditions determine the mode of bending and the distance between inflection points on the deflected column. The inflection points in the deflection shape of the column are the points at which the curvature of the column change sign and are also the points at which the internal bending moments are zero. The closer together the inflection points are, the higher the resulting capacity of the column.

A demonstration model illustrating the different "Euler" buckling modes. The model shows how the boundary conditions affect the critical load of a slender column. Notice that each of the columns are identical, apart from the boundary conditions.

The strength of a column may therefore be increased by distributing the material so as to increase the moment of inertia. This can be done without increasing the weight of the column by distributing the material as far from the principal axis of the cross section as possible, while

keeping the material thick enough to prevent local buckling. This bears out the well-known fact that a tubular section is much more efficient than a solid section for column service. Another bit of information that may be gleaned from this equation is the effect of length on critical load. For a given size column, doubling the unsupported length quarters the allowable load. The restraint offered by the end connections of a column also affects the critical load. If the connections are perfectly rigid, the critical load will be four times that for a similar column where there is no resistance to rotation (in which case the column is idealized as having hinges at the ends). Since the radius of gyration is defined as the square root of the ratio of the column's cross section to its area, the above formula may be rearranged as follows. Using the Euler formula for hinged ends, and substituting Ar2 for I, the following formula results.

where

is the allowable stress of the column, and

is the

slenderness ratio. Since structural columns are commonly of intermediate length, and it is impossible to obtain an ideal column, the Euler formula on its own has little practical application for ordinary design. Issues that cause deviation from the pure Euler column behaviour include imperfections in geometry in combination with plasticity/non-linear stress strain behaviour of the column's material. Consequently, a number of empirical column formulae have been developed to agree with test data, all of which embody the slenderness ratio. For design, appropriate safety factors are introduced into these formulae. One such formula is the Perry Robertson formula which estimates the critical buckling load based on an initial (small) curvature. The Rankine Gordon formula (Named for William John Macquorn Rankine and Perry Hugesworth Gordon (1899 1966)) is also based on experimental results and suggests that a column will buckle at a load Fmax given by:

where Fe is the Euler maximum load and Fc is the maximum compressive load. This formula typically produces a conservative estimate of Fmax.

Self-buckling[edit]
A free-standing, vertical column, with density , Young's modulus , and radius , will buckle under its own weight if its height exceeds a certain critical height:[1][2][3]

where g is the acceleration due to gravity, I is the second moment of area of the beam cross section, and B is the first zero of the Bessel function of the first kind of order 1/3, which is equal to 1.86635086...

Buckling under tensile dead loading[edit]

Fig. 2: Elastic beam system showing buckling under tensile dead loading.

Usually buckling and instability are associated to compression, but recently Zaccaria, Bigoni, Noselli and Misseroni (2011)[4] have shown that buckling and instability can also occur in elastic structures subject to dead tensile load. An example of a single-degree-of-freedom structure is shown in Fig. 1, where the critical load is also indicated. Another example involving flexure of a structure made up of beam elements governed by the equation of the Euler's elastica is shown in Fig.2. In both cases, there are no elements subject to compression. The instability and buckling in tension are related to the presence of the slider,

the junction between the two rods, allowing only relative sliding between the connected pieces.

Constraints, curvature and multiple buckling[edit]

Fig. 3: A one-degree-of-freedom structure exhibiting a tensile (compressive) buckling load as related to the fact that the right end has to move along the circular profile labeled 'Ct' (labelled 'Cc').

Buckling of an elastic structure strongly depends on the curvature of the constraints against which the ends of the structure are prescribed to move (see Bigoni, Misseroni, Noselli and Zaccaria, 2012[5]). In fact, even a singledegree-of-freedom system (see Fig.3) may exhibit a tensile (or a compressive) buckling load as related to the fact that one end has to move along the circular profile labeled 'Ct' (labelled 'Cc').

Fig. 4: A one-degree-of-freedom structure with a 'S'-shaped bicircular profile exhibiting multiple bifurcations (both tensile and compressive).

The two circular profiles can be arranged in a 'S'-shaped profile, as shown in Fig.4; in that case a discontinuity of the constraint's curvature is introduced, leading to multiple bifurcations. Note that the single-degree-of-freedom structure shown in Fig.4 has two buckling loads (one tensile and one compressive). Watch a movie for more details.

Flutter instability[edit]
Structures subject to a follower (nonconservative) load may suffer instabilities which are not of the buckling type and therefore are not detectable with a static approach.[6] For instance, the so-called 'Ziegler column' is shown in Fig.5.

Fig. 5: A sketch of the 'Ziegler column', a two-degree-of-freedom system subject to a follower load (the force P remains always parallel to the rod BC), exhibiting flutter and divergence instability. The two rods, of linear mass density , are rigid and connected through two rotational springs of stiffness k1 and k2.

This two-degree-of-freedom system does not display a quasi-static buckling, but becomes dynamically unstable. To see this, we note that the equations of motion are

and their linearized version is

Assuming a time-harmonic solution in the form

we find the critical loads for flutter ( divergence ( ),

) and

where

and

Fig. 6: A sequence of deformed shapes at consecutive times intervals of the structure sketched in Fig.5 and exhibiting flutter (upper part) and divergence (lower part) instability.

Flutter instability corresponds to a vibrational motion of increasing amplitude and is shown in Fig.6 (upper part) together with the divergence instability (lower part) consisting in an exponential growth. Recently, Bigoni and Noselli (2011)[7] have experimentally shown that flutter and divergence instabilities can be directly related to dry friction, watch the movie for more details.

Various forms of buckling[edit]

Buckling is a state which defines a point where an equilibrium configuration becomes unstable under a parametric change of load and can manifest itself in several different phenomena. All can be classified as forms of bifurcation.

There are four basic forms of bifurcation associated with loss of structural stability or buckling in the case of structures with a single degree of freedom. These comprise two types of pitchfork bifurcation, one saddle-node bifurcation (often referred to as a limit point) and onetranscritical bifurcation. The pitchfork bifurcations are the most commonly studied forms and include the buckling of columns and struts, sometimes known as Euler buckling; the buckling of plates, sometimes known as local buckling, which is well known to be relatively safe (both are supercritical phenomena) and the buckling of shells, which is well-known to be a highly dangerous (subcritical phenomenon).[8]Using the concept of potential energy, equilibrium is defined as a stationary point with respect to the degree(s) of freedom of the structure. We can then determine whether the equilibrium is stable, if the stationary point is a local minimum; or unstable, if it is a maximum, point of inflection or saddle point (for multiple-degree-of-freedom structures only) see animations below.