Constructal design applied to geometrical evaluation of rectangular plates with inclined stiffeners subjected to uniform transverse load

This study employs the Constructal Design method associated with the computational modeling (by the Finite Element Method) to evaluate the mechanical behavior related to deflections of stiffened rectangular steel plates submitted to uniform transverse loading. To do so, a rectangular reference plate without stiffeners was used. A material volume portion of this plate was converted into stiffeners through the parameter ϕ, which represents the ratio between the stiffeners volume and the total volume of the reference plate. By adopting ϕ = 0.3, 50 stiffened plates were configured: 25 with orthogonal stiffeners to the plate edges and 25 with stiffeners oriented at 45°. Keeping the total volume of material constant, the influence of the orientation of the stiffeners and the effect of the degree of freedom hs/ts (ratio between height and thickness) variation were numerically analyzed. The results showed that variations in the geometry of the stiffeners can increase the rigidity of the plate, reducing its deflection. Further, it has been found that depending on the number of stiffeners, orienting them at 45° may be an alternative to minimize deflections in rectangular plates.