FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS OF RECTANGULAR TANKS WITH OPENING

Abstract

The openings in rectangular tanks are provided in some special circumstances e.g. to provide inlet and outlet for fluid, inspection holes etc. These openings cause the high moment peaks at the corners of openings. So a meticulous analysis of such problems is essential. The purpose of this study is to develope a computer programme using "Finite Element Analysis" technique to analyse the complex behaviour of rectangular tanks with rectangular openings. The flat ( facet ) shell element haS been used for the purpose of analysis. Facet element incorporates a fictitious sixth degree of freedom. This flat shell element assumes that the bending characteristics and stretching characteristics are uncoupled. Alongwith the development of the programme RTANK, a detailed analysis of different cases of rectangular tank with rectangular opening has been carried out. The opening has been placed at different locations with variation in size for the purpose of analysis. It is observed from the results of present study that the effect of opening is complex in nature and prominently manifested for the variations in size and location of opening. The opening at the centre of base edge has been found the most critical among all the studied problems