Plate Buckling of Glass Panels

Andreas Luible, Schmidlin Ltd. Facade Technology
Michel Crisinel, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne EPFL

This paper describes investigations conducted at the Steel Structures Laboratory ICOM of EPFL on the stability of load carrying glass elements. The plate buckling behaviour of single layer and laminated safety glass is studied by means of plate buckling tests, analytical and numerical models. It is shown that glass panels have a large post critical load carrying capacity. The initial fracture occurs always on the glass surface under tensile strength. A design method with buckling curves using a slenderness ratio based on effective tensile strength seems applicable for the design of glass panels. As a result of numerical simulations, recommendations for the future development of plate buckling curves for glass elements under compression are given.

Full-Text Article [448 KB]

The Authors

	Dr. Andreas Luible Head of competence centre for facade engineering Lucerne University of Applied Science and Art Andreas Luible finished his doctoral theses at the EPFL Lausanne about stability problems of load carrying glass elements in 2004.He obtained his civil engineering degree from the Technical University... Read more
	Mr. Michel Crisinel Lecturer at EPFL Retired from EPFL Civil Engineer EPFL-SIA Lecturer, Section head and deputy-director of Steel Structures Laboratory ICOM of Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne EPFL. Born 1945, Michel Crisinel receiv... Read more