THEORY OF

PLATES AND
SHELLS

BY ER. GIRISH S. DESHMUKH

 Defination
Plates is a two-dimensional structural component
whose one dimension (referred to as thickness h) is
much smaller than the other dimensions.

X, u

Y, v

Z, w
b
h
a
CIVIL ENGINEERING
FLOOR AND FOUNDATION SLABS, lock-gates, thin
retaining walls, bridge decks and slab bridges.
Slab
LOCK-GATES
THIN RETAINING WALLS
Bridge Decks
 SHIPPING

Fig 3 - Merchant ship

Fig 4 - Section A–A

AEROSPACE STRUCTURES

Fig 5 - Airplane

Fig 6 - Fuselage
Stiff plates are thin plates with flexural rigidity
h  1 to 1
L 50 10
Carries loads by bending and torsional moments and
by transverse shear, generally in a manner similar to
beams.

Fig 6 – Stiff Plate

Moderately thick plates are in many respects
similar to stiff plates, with exception of effects
of transverse shear forces on the normal stress
components are also taken into account.

h  1 to 1
L 10 5
Membranes are very thin plates without flexural
rigidity,
h 1
L 50
carrying loads by axial and central shear forces.

Fig 7 – Membrane
Thick plates have an internal stress condition
that resembles that of three-dimensional
continua.
h 1
L 5

Fig 8- Thick Plates

All the external loads carried by plates are
predominantly perpendicular to the plate
surface.

These external loads are carried by internal

bending, torsional moments and by transverse
shear forces.
 Fig 1:- Laterally loaded rectangular plate

Fig 2:- Stress components on plate element

  x  xy  xz 
 
State of stress at a point     yx  y  yz 
 zx  zy  z 
 

At a point there are three mutually perpendicular

planes i.e. orthogonal planes. Three stresses
components, one normal and two shears, act on
each plane.
Therefore, nine stress components must be
known at each point to define completely state
of stress at a point. Therefore six stress
components in the Cartesian ( x, y, z ) co-
ordinate system.
shear stresses are complementary i.e.
 xy   yx ;  yz   zy and  xz   zx
Therefore stress at a point is specified as
 x  xy  xz 
 
    xy  y  yz 
 xz  yz  z 
 
Similarly, six stress components in the
cylindrical ( r,θ , z ) co-ordinate system.
 r  r  rz 
     z 
   r
 
 rz   z  z 
 The nine components of strain are reduced to six
independent components, three linear strains
corresponding to the change in line elements and
three shear strains corresponding to the change
in right angles formed by line elements.

u v 
x  ; y  ; z  arethe Linear Strain Components nd
x y z
u v u  v 
 xy   ;  xz   ;  yz   arethe Shear Strain Components
y x z x z y
Thus the state of strain at a point of a body in the
Cartesian ( x, y, z ) co-ordinate system can be
expressed in the matrix form as

x  xy  xz 
 
    xy  y  yz 
 xz  yz  z 

 The six strain components, three linear strain
and three shear strains, at a point of the body are
related to the three displacements u, v, and w by
the following expressions in the Cartesian ( x, y,
z ) co-ordinate system

u v 
Normal Strain Components :  x  ;  y  ;  z 
x y z
u v u  v 
Shear Strain Components :  xy   ;  xz   ;  yz  
y x z x z y
The equilibrium equations in the Cartesian ( x, y,
z ) co-ordinate system are given by
 x  xy  xz
  X 0
x y z
 xy  y  yz
  Y  0
x y z
 xz  yz
 z
  Z 0
x y z
Where X, Y and Z are the components of body
force such as gravitational, centrifugal, or other
inertia forces.
If the three displacement components are given
(i.e. u, v & w) then the strain components can be
uniquely determined.  x ,  y ,  z ,  xy ,  xz and  yz
If, on the other hand, the six strain components
are arbitrarily specified at a point, then the
displacement components cannot be uniquely
determined. This is because the six strain
components are related to only three
displacement components viz u,v and w.
 These relations are called the strain
compatibility equations. For three dimensional
bodies there exist six strain compatibility
equations.

 x
2
 y
2
  xy
2
 x
2
   xy  xz  yz 
 2  ;2     
y 2
x xy yz x  z y x 
  y   z   yz
2 2 2
 y
2
   xy  xz  yz 
 2  ;2     
z 2
y yz xz y  z y x 
 2 x  2 z  2 xz  2 z    xz  yz  xy 
 2  ;2     
z 2
x xz xy z  y x z 
 For isotropic material, generalized Hook’s law
gives the following stress strain relations.

 x   x    y   z   ;  y   y    x   z  
1 1
 
E E
 xy  yz  xz
 z   z    y   x   and  xy  ;  yz  ;  xz 
1
 
E G G G

Where ,
υ, E and G are the elastic properties of the
material
Exact stress analysis of a thin plate subjected to
loads acting normal to its surface needs solution
of the differential equations of three-dimensional
elasticity.
For the vast majority of technical applications
Kirchhoff’s classical theory of thin plates yields
sufficiently accurate results.
It is formulated in terms of transverse
deflections w(x, y) of fourth order, requiring only
two boundary conditions to be satisfied at each
edge.
The material follows Hooke’s law.
The plate is initially flat.
The middle surface of the plate remains
unstrained during bending.
The constant thickness of the plate, h, is small
compared to its other dimensions; that is, the
smallest lateral dimension of the plate is at least
10 times larger than its thickness.(b  10  h)
The transverse deflections w(x, y) are small
compared to the plate thickness.
 Slopes of the defected middle surface are small
compared to unity.
Bernoulli’s hypothesis is true for plate also.
shear deformations are neglected.
The normal stress  z in the direction transverse
to the plate surface can be neglected.

The above assumptions, known as Kirchhoff’s

hypothesis.
With the help of these assumptions, original three-dimensional stress problems of
elasticity are reduced to two-dimensional problems of plates.
Laterally loaded rectangular plate.
For rectangular plates the use of a rectangular
Cartesian coordinate system is most convenient.
Deflection components in direction of the
coordinate axes X, Y and Z are u, v and w are
considered positive when they point toward the
positive coordinate axes .
When moments produce tension in the fibers
located at the bottom part of the pertinent
section. Then such moments are considered as
Positive.
 Displacements in the x, y and z directions are
w w
u  z ; v  z ; w  w( x, y )        (01)
x y

Components of strain are :

u v u v
 x  ;  y  ;  xy  
x y y x
2w 2w 2w
i.e.  x   z 2 ;  y   z 2 ;  xy  2 z       (02)
x y x y
Corresponding stresses are:
E E
x  ( x   y );  y  ( y   x )
(1  )
2
(1  )
2

E
and  xy   xy
2 (1  )
i.e. after substitution of strains we get
z E  2w 2w 
x  2 
 2  ;
(1  )  x 2
y 
z E  2w 2w 
y  2 
 2 
(1  )  y 2
x 
 2w 
and  xy   2G  
 x y 
E  2w 
         (03)
(1  )  x y 
Consider an element of a rectangular plate which
is subjected to a system of internal forces and
external load q per unit area.
For thin plates, the dead load of the plate can be
combined with lateral load q.
Since the plate element considered is very small
we will not consider the variation of forces on
each edge, but instead assume that the mean
value of forces would be acting at the centre of
each face or edge.
The bending and twisting moments and shear
forces acting on the plate area of unit width and
height h are shown in following figure.
 Where,
Mx, My = Bending moments on a plane normal to
the x and y axes respectively.
M xy =Twisting moments on a plane normal to the x
axes in the direction y.
Q x , Qy = Transverse shear forces on a plane
normal to the and axes respectively
Now, since moments are resultant of the stresses
developed in the plate, these are called stress
resultant and are forces per unit length of the
plate. Which are given by
h 2 h 2

Mx  
h 2
x  b  z  dz  dy  
h 2
x  z  dz        (04)

Substituting value of σx from eq (03)

Where D is flexural rigidity of plate and w
denotes small deflection of the plate in z
direction
 Now in the same manner we can calculate
moment in y direction,
h 2 h 2

My  
h 2
y  b  z  dz  dy  
h 2
y  z  dz        (05)

After simplification we will get

 2w 2w 
M y   D  2  2         (06)
 y x 
In the same manner we can calculate Mxy
h 2

M xy  
h 2
xy  z  dz

2w
  D(1  )        (07)
x y

Now taking moments of all forces on the

element with respect to x axis and equating to
zero, we obtained the equation of equilibrium
i.e.  M x  0
While obtaining above
equilibrium equation, the
moment due to lateral load
q and the moment due to
the rate of change of shear
forces have been neglected
since these quantities are
multiplied by terms which
are very small.
Considering all the forces acting on the element
in the z direction we obtain the following
equation of equilibrium. If q (x, y) = intensity of
distributed external load on the plate surface,
then considering equilibrium of forces in the z
direction,
Since there are no forces in the x and y
directions and no moments with respect to the z
axis
Which is the Lagrange equilibrium equation for
the bending of thin plate with constant thickness.
Therefore the solution of the problem of bending
of plates by a lateral load reduces tothe
integration of equation
The corresponding normal and shearing stresses
are obtained from equation

The shearing stresses and xz yz τ τ can now be

determined by assuming that they are distributed
across the thickness of the plate according to the
parabolic law
1. Simply supported edge conditions:-
Along the simply supported edge
the bending moment and deflection would be zero.
The condition on a simply supported edge parallel
to y axis at x = a

Since the changes of w w.r.t. y co-ordinate vanishes

along the edge
The condition on a simply supported edge parallel
to x axis at y = b

Since the changes of w w.r.t. x co-ordinate vanishes

along the edge
2. Clamped edge conditions:-
If a plate is clamped the deflection and slope of the
middle surface must vanish at the boundary.
on a clamped edge parallel to y axis at x = a the
boundary conditions are

on a clamped edge parallel to x axis at y = b the

boundary conditions are
3. Free edge condition:-
In the most general case a twisting moment,
bending moment and transverse shear force acts
on an edge of the plate. An edge on which all
these three stresses vanishes is defined as free
edge.
Later on Kirchhoff provided that three boundary
conditions are too many and so that two
conditions are sufficient for the complete
determination of w satisfy the equation∇4 w =
q/D.
Kirchhoff pointed out that the two conditions
prescribing M xy and Qx can be replaced by a
single one.
The reason is that
the twisting moment
acting on an element
of the edge of the
plate may be
replaced by two
statically equivalent
vertical forces,
which can then
combined with the
vertical shearing
forces.
The Navier’s solution is very straight forward.

Applies only to the limited category of simply

supported rectangular plate.

Levy gave general solution technique to lateral

deflection of plate with other boundary
conditions.
Two opposite edges are simply supported and
other two edges with arbitrary supports or any
type of supports.

Whole load q is shared along Simply Supported

direction which producing deflection in other
direction.

Single trigonometric series is used.

The origin is o is taken at the midpoint of the side b.
The boundary condition at x = 0 and x = a are simply
supported where as those at y = ± b / 2 are arbitrary .
A typical plate strip of unit width ‘AB’ spanning along X
is assumed to behave as a simply supported beam of
span ‘a’ with the difference that the flexural rigidity of
this strip is D not EI.
 Differential equation of any arbitrary plate strip
AB as a beam is  w4  2 2 w 2   w4  q( x, y )
4 4 4

x x y y D
 4
Solution of this diff. equation is w1 ( x)  q1( x )
x 4 D
Since w1(x) is the function of x only derivative
with respect to y vanishes from the equation.
Consider a rectangular plate simply supported
all along the edges is acted on by moment M
distributed along the edges at y =± b / 2

The equation be

m x
w  w2 ( x, y)   Ym sin
m 1 a
Since acting load is moment all the four
constants will be operative in the equation of
deflection
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