The Influence of the Mesh Size on Numerical Simulations of Dynamic Buckling of the Stiffened Cylindrical Shell Subjected to Underwater Explosion Shock Wave

Dynamic buckling of submerged cylindrical shells subjected to underwater explosion (UNDEX) seriously threatens the safety of structures. Due to fluid–structure interaction, geometric and material nonlinearities, the relevant theoretical, numerical and experimental studies are very limited. Dynamic buckling of a stiffened cylindrical shell subjected to the UNDEX shock wave is numerically studied by the coupled acoustic-structural formulation in ABAQUS/Explicit, and the influence of the mesh size of the cylindrical shell on the buckling behavior is investigated. Both the hydrostatic pressure and the UNDEX shock wave acting on the shell are considered in the finite element model. The mesh size for the static buckling analysis of unstiffened cylindrical shells, \(\sqrt {R{\text{t}}} /2\) , is taken as the benchmark of the mesh size of the cylindrical shell, where R is the radius of the cylindrical shell, and t is the thickness of the shell. Then, different smaller mesh sizes of the cylindrical shell and the flow filed are adopted. Numerical results show that the mesh size of the cylindical shell has significant influence on the dynamic buckling of the cylindrical shell subjected to UNDEX shock wave. Furthermore, the suggested mesh size of the cylindrical shell is proposed.