Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Thin-Walled Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tws

Buckling design of large circular steel silos subject to wind pressure

Yang Zhao, Qing-shuai Cao, Liang Su n
Space Structures Research Center, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China

art ic l e i nf o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Received 27 May 2013
Accepted 20 August 2013
Available online 27 September 2013

Large steel silos are typical kinds of thin-walled structure which are widely used for storing huge
quantities of granular solids in industry and agriculture. In the present analyses, buckling design of large
steel silo subject to wind pressure is demonstrated in accordance with Eurocode (EN1990, 1991, 1993)
and the proposed combinational Load Case WE (wind and empty silo) and WF (wind and full silo). The
nite element model is established by using the commercial general purpose computer package ANSYS.
Five types of buckling analyses are carried out for the geometrically perfect and imperfect models with
and without the consideration of the material plasticity, which are designated as LBA, GNA, GMNA, GNIA,
and GMNIA in EN 1993 Part 16. The geometrical imperfections are known to have a large impact on the
buckling behavior of steel silo structure, in which the magnitude and distribution of the weld depression
during construction process is adopted to account for fabrication quality. The buckling behavior of a
reference silo with a diameter of 40 m and an aspect ratio of 0.9 is rst investigated, which shows that
the buckling behaviors from Load Case WE and WF are much different. The material nonlinearity shows
little inuence on buckling resistance in Load Case WE, while the buckling resistance and buckling mode
is much sensitive to weld imperfection. In Load Case WF, both material nonlinearity and geometrical
nonlinearity effect is strong and detrimental to buckling behavior of steel silos, resulting in decrease of
buckling resistance. The buckling deformation corresponding to the critical point in Load Case WE is
governed by the circumferential compression which is generated in the windward region of the shells
localized at the top part of silo wall. The buckling mode in Load Case WF takes the form of the wellknown elephant-foot deformation at the bottom part of the shell wall, which is induced by the
meridional compressive stress. It is also indicated from the parametric analyses that the buckling
resistance of steel silo is closely correlative with the loading conditions involving the wind velocity, the
patch load, and the geometrical parameters including the aspect ratio, the radius-to-thickness ratio, the
type of wall thickness, and the wall openings.
& 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Steel silo
Wind pressure
Buckling
Geometrical nonlinearity
Material nonlinearity
Weld imperfection

1. Introduction
Large steel silos widely used for storing huge quantities of
granular solids in industry and agriculture are typical kinds of
thin-walled structure which usually consist of a rigid at bottom, a
cylindrical shell with stepped wall thickness, a conical or dome
roof on the top and above afliated buildings. The silo wall may be
supported in two fundamental forms: the discrete support and the
ground support. The former type is applicable for the silo with
small diameter which is constructed using a local bracket or
column, giving a limited number of narrow supports around the
silo circumference, and the latter is appropriate to the silo with
large diameter (such as diameter larger than 15 m) which is
supported exactly on bottom plate with the underpass beneath
the at bottom [1,2]. With the development of domestic economy,

Corresponding author. Tel.: 86 571 88208752.

E-mail address: suliang@zju.edu.cn (L. Su).

0263-8231/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tws.2013.08.015

the request for storage of some strategic materials in china, such as

the grain, the coal, the cement, etc, becomes larger and larger. Both
the number and capacity of steel silo has been increasing for
recent decades. The diameters of some steel silos are even larger
than 100 m, with the contents more than 100,000 m3. Fig. 1 shows
a practical ground-supported circular steel silo.
Large steel silo is usually squat with a large diameter to
thickness ratio, which is particularly vulnerable to buckling under
wind pressure when the silo is either empty or partially lled. The
structural design of circular steel silos subject to wind pressure is
well known to be usually controlled by considerations of buckling
of silo wall with the buckling deformation as the potential failure
mode. The design is concerned with a complicated process, which
would be demonstrated in accordance with the current European
standard: EN1990, 1991 and 1993 [18] in the following presentation. The buckling design of steel silo structure is dominated by the
resistance of shell wall to buckling failure in service, which is
supposed to take two categories of nonuniform pressures into
account [1,2,5]: the wind pressure on external surface of silo wall

338

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

Fig. 1. A practical ground-supported circular steel silo.

and the wall pressure exerted by the stored granular solids. Whilst
the buckling behavior of cylindrical shells subject to wind pressures have been extensively explored, few studies have evaluate
the effects of wind pressure on steel silo when it is empty or full,
and the buckling design of steel silos considering combined wind
load and bulk solids pressure has received even less attention.
The wind pressure on external surface of cylindrical shells as silos,
tanks and bins have held the interest of many researchers [913],
who try to determinate the distribution and magnitude of wind
pressure by wind tunnel test [9,12,13] or numerical simulation. Wind
pressures and buckling of cylindrical steel tanks with a conical and
dome roof are presented by Portela and Godoy [12,13], which shows
that buckling occurs in the form of deections in the cylindrical shell
and the buckling mode is localized in the windward region. The
study of anchored stocky and intermediate length cylindrical shells
of uniform thickness under wind pressure is presented by Chen et al.
[14], which indicates that both linear and nonlinear analyses predict
the circumferential compression buckling mode in stocky cylinders.
The buckling behavior of cylindrical shells with stepwise wall
thickness under uniform external pressure is also explored by Chen
et al. [15], who make predictions for a wide range of geometries of
silos and tanks with both anchored and unanchored base boundaries. The buckling of cylindrical steel tanks under wind pressure is
evaluated for conical roof and open top tanks by Sosa and Godoy
[16], to compute a lower-bound for critical wind pressures and the
results are compared with the static nonlinear analysis carried out on
the same models. Load-bearing capacity of slender wind-loaded
cylindrical shells is also investigated by Schneider and Zahlten [17]
with consideration of geometrical and material nonlinerity, which
shows that the slender shells do not behave as beams under wind
loading in stress state, failure loads and failure modes. Buckling
results could also be found in other investigations [1821] for
diversity of geometries and load conditions of shells. The postbuckling behavior is also evaluated by Schmidt et al. [22] through
numerical analyses and experimental verication, and some useful
recommendations are put forward for an economic postbuckling
strength design strategy.
The effect of imperfections on wind-pressurized cylindrical
shells is evaluated by Greiner and Derler [23], while the imperfection sensitivity to elastic buckling of wind loaded open cylindrical
tanks is reported by Godoy and Flores [24]. Pircher [25] explores
the inuence of a weld-induced axisymmetric imperfection on the
buckling of a medium-length silo under wind loading, who found
that the position of the weld along the height of the thin-walled
cylinder has a great inuence on the buckling strength under
wind-loading and weld-induced residual stress elds reduce the
buckling resistance by a small amount.

For recent decade, the buckling failures of wind-pressurized

steel cylindrical containers, such as silos and tanks, have been
frequently reported [2629] during their normal service or during
construction. It is conrmed by the large numbers of engineering
practice that the wind load or the bulk solids pressure on
cylindrical shell wall are the main causes which would lead to
buckling failure of such kind of structures.
This paper investigates the buckling behavior of steel silo
through great deal of numerical analyses, which aims to improve
the understanding of large circular steel silos subject to wind
pressure, when the silos are either empty or full. The layout is
organized as follows: Section 2 summarizes the load cases relating
to wind pressure proposed by Eurocode [17], together with the
wall pressure exerted by bulk solids and the wind pressure on
external surface of silo; Section 3 then expatiates upon the nite
element model and the types of buckling analyses; the numerical
results of the reference silo with the diameter of 40 m and aspect
ratio h/d of 0.9 are presented for both the perfect and imperfect
models in all proposed buckling analyses in Section 4 and the
assessments of the different consequences of different load cases
are also made for the buckling resistance and buckling mode; the
parametric studies of the wind velocity ranging from 20 m/s to
60 m/s, the patch load, and the geometry parameter including the
aspect ratio h/d ranging from 0.5 to 1.1, the radius-to-thickness
ratio r/teq ranging from 500 to 1000, the type of wall section
(uniform, stepped, or tapered wall), the wall openings, are specially undertaken in Section 5 and some valuable conclusions
expected to benet the understanding of the buckling behavior of
steel silos subject to wind pressures are obtained in Section 6.

2. Load cases
Silos are different to many other structures because they may
be subjected to the full loads from the particulate solids for most
of their life, accordingly silos should be designed taking account of
actions exerted by the particulate solids and combinations with
other actions, such as wind pressure on the one hand. On the other
hand, when emptying of solids in the silo is complete (empty silo),
the wind pressure on external surface of silo wall would become
dominant in verifying the ultimate limit state of buckling. The
following actions are supposed to be considered in the ultimate
limit state design of the silo: wind pressure when the silo is either
full or empty, wall pressure during lling and storage of particulate
solids, permanent action (self-weight), which would be introduced
in brief and determined in accordance with Eurocode [17].
In addition, buckling analyses for exploring the ultimate limit
state of silos depends strongly on the following working conditions: the action assessment class, the fabrication tolerance quality
class, the consequence class, which takes account of the inuence
of the silo capacity, the supporting patterns, and the eccentricity
during lling and discharge, fabrication imperfection, etc., as
appropriate. In this paper, large diameter of steel silo is taken as
the reference example whose contents are usually more than
50,000 t in normal service life. The associated requirements of the
above design conditions for buckling assessment are specied in
Eurocodes [1,2,7], the appropriate design conditions are adopted
and listed in Table 1.
2.1. Wind pressure
The wind action has been an integral part of structural design.
The distribution and magnitude of wind pressure on silo structure
are to be calculated in accordance with EN 1991-1-4 [5], which
gives guidance on the determination of natural wind actions
for the structural design of building and civil engineering works.

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

pwf z phf z

in which, and K are the unit weight and lateral pressure ratio of
the particulate solid, respectively; is the wall friction coefcient
for solid sliding on the vertical wall; z0 r/(2K) for circular silos,

h0

equivalent surface

pw

ph
pp

hp

The variation of wind pressure coefcient cp around half

circumference is plotted in Fig. 2 for various aspect ratios h/d
( 0.5, 0.7, 0.9 and 1.1), in which wind pressure is positive directed
towards the external surface in the adjacent zone of the origin at
the windward generator, and becomes negative directed away
from the external surface beyond a certain critical angle from
windward generator origin. The critical circumferential angle cr
which distinguish the windward area (wind pressure) from leeward area (wind suction) is about 421, 401, 391 and 381 for silo
aspect ratio h/d of 0.5, 0.7, 0.9 and 1.1, respectively. The peak
positive pressure coefcient is equal to 1.0 obtained on the windward meridian, while the peak negative suction coefcient is
found to be  0.93, 1.17,  1.30 and  1.38 for silo aspect ratio
h/d of 0.5, 0.7, 0.9 and 1.1 at an angle of about 831 from the
windward generator origin.
As steel silos are constructed mostly in the open country
terrain, the terrain category II [5] is assumed and applied to the
following numerical analyses. The basic wind velocity vb is
postulated as 20 m/s corresponding to wind grade Gale in
Beaufort scale.

Eurocode: EN 1991-4 [1], principles for the determination of

pressures on the vertical walls of silos are denitely provided that
the wall pressures induced by stored bulk solids during the lling
and discharge shall be evaluated according to the slenderness (the
aspect ratio) of the silo. The pressures on vertical wall of silo
induced by the stored bulk solids are composed of two parts: the
symmetrical component and the non-symmetrical component
referred to as the patch load in EN 1991-4 [1], which shall be
taken to act simultaneously on the wall of silo. The symmetrical
component consists of horizontal pressures ph and vertical frictional pressures pw on the wall. For the squat silos, the lling
pressures phf and pwf are given by Eq. (2) and Eq. (3), and the
distributions of solid pressures along the depth are shown in Fig. 3.




n 
zh0
phf z Kz0 1
1
2
z0 h0

s=0.2d

The distribution of wind pressures around a squat circular silo can

be important to the assessment of wind buckling resistance. The
pressure variation around an isolated silo may be dened in terms
of the circumferential coordinate with its origin at the windward
generator (see Fig. 2). The circumferential variation of the pressure
distribution cp (positive inward) on an isolated closed roof silo is
recommended by EN 1993-4-1 [2] in following expression:






d
d
d
C p 0:54 0:16 0:28 0:04
cos 1:040:2
cos 2
h
h
h






d
d
1
cos 3 0:140:05
cos 4
0:360:05
h
h

339

2.2. Bulk solid pressure

The distribution patterns and magnitudes of pressures on the
silo wall exerted by the stored granular solid have been a crucial
problem to be solved for design of silos. In the recently published
Table 1
Design conditions assumed for the numerical analyses.
Design
Action
conditions assessment
class

Fabrication tolerance
quality class

Consequence
class

Wall
surface
class

Grade

Class B high: quality

parameter Q 25.

CC3

D1

d
Fig. 3. Schematic distribution of solid pressure on silo wall.

1.0
0.5
wind

0.0

(o)

cr

Cp

AAC3

-0.5
-1.0
d

-1.5

h/d=0.5
h/d=0.9

h/d=0.7
h/d=1.1

45

90

135

Fig. 2. Wind pressure variation around half circumference for various aspect ratio h/d.

180

340

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

and r is the radius of silo. h0 is the depth below the equivalent

surface to the lowest point on the wall that is not in contact with
the stored solid of the top pile, while h0 r tan r =3 for a
symmetrically lled circular silo with top pile. n 1
tan r 1h0 =z0 , and r is the angle of repose of the particulate
solid of conical pile.
Before pressures on vertical wall of silo can be evaluated, the
relevant properties of the stored particulate solid have to be made
clear rst. For commonly encountered bulk solids in industry such
as cement clinker, the characteristic value of material properties
are: 18 kN/m3, K 0.38  1.31 0.498, 0.46  1.07 0.492,
and r 471 which are excerpted from Table C.2, EN 1991-4 [1].
The characteristic values K, are determined by multiplying or
dividing the corresponding mean value by the conversion factors
a: K aKKm, am. When a limit state verication is sensitive to
the variability of a material property, upper and lower characteristic values of the material property should be taken into account
according to EN 1991 [1] and EN 1990 [3]. As a result, K, are
chosen the upper values resulting in maximum frictional pressures
with corresponding horizontal wall pressures.
2.3. Permanent action
Permanent action is taken into account in combinations of
actions as a single action, which includes the total self-weight of
structural and non-structural members. The cylindrical wall of silo
provides structural stiffness for resisting the meridional stress and
transverse shear, which is treated as structural element. The nonstructural members of silos includes mainly the roong system,
such as the roof supporting members, the top building, the
surfacing and coverings, xed services, etc., which is comprised
by a overall uniform load 1.5 kN/m2 acting on the roof in the
gravitational direction. The self-weight of silo wall as structural
element is accounted for automatically by the nite element
program, and the self-weight of roong system as non-structural
members is converted to edge load uniformly acting on the top
edge of silo wall, as the roof system is excluded from the numerical
model (see Fig. 4).
2.4. Load cases
Partial factor method is implemented for limit state verications of structural equilibrium subject to combinations of actions,
which is stipulated by EN 1990 [3]. When using the partial factor

Table 2
Summary of combinations of actions to be considered (by EN1991-4 and EN1990).
Load Cases

Dominant
action
Wind (f  0)

Permanent
action
Self-weight (f  0)

Accompanying
action
Solid lling (f  0)

WE (wind and
empty silo)
WF (wind and
full silo)

1.5  1.0

0.9  1.0

1.5  1.0

1.1  1.0

1.5  1.0

method, it is veried in EN 1990 [3] that in all relevant design

situations, no relevant limit state is exceeded when design values
for actions or effects of actions and resistances are used in the
design models.
Two working stages of silo are selected as representative of
load cases relating to wind pressures, which agree well with the
empty silo before lling and the full silos during storage in their
service life. The Load Cases used for numerical verication of limit
state and also proposed by EN1991-4 [1] are summarized in
Table 2 together with the recommended partial factor f and
combination factor 0. The dominant action and the permanent
action are taken at their full value in each Load Case, but the
accompanying actions is reduced by the combination factor 0 to
account for the reduced probability of simultaneous occurrence in
accordance with EN 1990 [3].
In above action combinations, the self-weight of structure is
regarded as unfavorable for the full silo and favorable for the
empty silo, thus the partial factor for self-weight is taken as
1.1 and 0.9 for the full and empty silos respectively. The wind
pressure on silo external surface and solid lling pressures for full
silos are deemed as unfavorable, thus the partial factor are both
taken as 1.5 (EN 1990 [3]).
The partial safety factor M1 for the resistance of shell wall to
stability is recommended for silos as 1.1 by EN 1993-4-1 [2], giving
an overall safety amplication factor applied to the design values
of the combination of actions for the relevant Load Case. This
safety factor of 1.1 provides a valuable reference for load proportionality factor against which nonlinear numerical analyses may
be estimated to obtain a realistic measure of safety of the designed
structure.

3. Numerical analysis procedure

3.1. Finite element model

Uy, Rotx,z =0

Uy, Rotx,z =0

Ux,y =0

u
v
w

Ux,y,z =0; Rotx,y,z =0

in cylindrical CS
Fig. 4. FE half-model of circular steel silo.

The buckling behavior of steel silos subject to wind pressure is

investigated using the commercial general purpose nite element
computer package ANSYS [30]. The 8-node quadratic isoparametric shell element SHELL93 involving both bending and membrane effect is used to discretize the shell wall. Each nite element
node has six degrees of freedom (DOF), including translations in
the nodal x, y, and z directions and rotations about the nodal x, y,
and z axes. The FE model is dened in the cylindrical coordinate
system (i.e., x-radial direction, y-circumferential direction, z-meridional direction), including the denition of silo geometries and
output results, except if it is specically stated. The results are
from top layer of the shell element, in which the meridional
displacement u, the circumferential displacement v are specied
as positive in the coordinate positive direction z, y and radial
displacement w as positive outwardly normal to the shell surface.
In the light of EN1991-1-4 [5], the wind pressure distribution
around the circumferential direction possess only one axis of
symmetry, so FE half-model of the silo structure is introduced in
the following numerical analyses, which is obtained by cutting the

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

shell wall vertically across a diametrical plane dened by the

origin of the windward generator of wind pressure. The halfmodel is as good as the complete model for structures whose
deformations are at least symmetric about one diametrical plane,
but exhibiting more computational efciency, as the half-model
and complete model are evidenced to show the identical structural
performances by FE results from both models.
The base strake of silo wall is commonly anchored to the rigid
bottom plate in most practical engineering, the bottom plate is
herein not included in the numerical model for simplication, and
all translational and rotational degrees of freedom (Ux,y,z, Rotx,y,
z 0) at bottom edge of silo is restrained as boundary conditions.
The roof and wind girder at the top of silo are meanwhile omitted
in the numerical model, so only a cylindrical shell is modeled. The
radial and tangential translational restrains (Ux,y 0) are applied
to the silo top to simulate the inuence of the roof and the wind
girder, as they provide realistic restraints of out-of-round deformation for silo top. The symmetric boundary condition (Uy, Rotx,
z 0) is correspondingly imposed in both the meridional cut edges
of the FE model. The nite element meshes and restrains condition
for boundary edges of the silo wall are shown in Fig. 4.
The material of the silo wall is assumed to be isotropic elasticperfectly plastic with properties typical of steel (grade S355): an
elastic modulus E of 2.1  105 N/mm2, a Poisson's ratio of 0.3 and
a characteristic value of yield strength fyk of 355 N/mm2 for wall
thickness no more than 40 mm (EN 1993-1-1 [6]).

3.2. Types of buckling analysis

The limit state of buckling should be taken as the condition in
which all or part of the structure suddenly develops large
displacements normal to the shell surface, caused by loss of
stability under compressive membrane or shear membrane stresses in the shell wall, leading to inability to sustain any increase in
the stress resultants, possibly causing total collapse of the structure. For the determination of load carrying capacities when
checking the buckling limit state, the following ve types of
buckling analysis are carried out for the numerical investigation
which is also recommended by EN 1993-1-6 [7].

341

bring about an effectively continuous taper and avoid discontinuity of wall stiffness compared to the stepped wall thickness. The
reference silo to be analyzed subsequently has a diameter d of
40 m, a height of silo wall h of 36 m, radius to equivalent thickness
ratio r/teq of 800 and thickness ratio tratio of 0.25 for Load Case WE
and Load Case WF, respectively. As a matter of convenience, the
conical pile of solid at the top is not considered here, i.e. h0 is
assumed to be zero in the following analyses. The aspect ratio of
the reference silo could then be obtained: h/d 0.9. The equivalent
thickness teq is determined by the wall thickness at the uppermost
ttop and at the bottom most tbase, and in the form of teq (ttop
tbase)/2, while the thickness ratio is dened by tratio ttop/tbase.
Another geometrical parameter which has been proved to have
much effect on buckling behavior of circular steel silo is the weld
depression imperfection arising from the fabrication process. In
the present analyses, the assumed shapes of weld depression are
adopted and introduced to the FE model, which are proposed by
Rotter and Teng [31] and given by Eqs. (4) and (5).
Type A : 0 exp




x
x
x
sin
cos
lc
lc
lc

Type B : 0 exp


x
x
cos
lc
lc

in which, 0 is the amplitude of the weld depression, assumed for

the following
analysis topbe
by EN1993-4 [2],
p
equal to wok dened
p
wok rt =Q and lc rt =312 1=4  2:44 rt , is the linear
meridional bending half wavelength, while t is equal to the
equivalent thickness of silo wall teq.
The shape dened by Eq. (5) (Type B) is modeled in the nite
element analysis throughout the height of silo to account for an
imperfect shell. The height of a normal strake is assumed to be
3.0 m. For the reference silo (h36 m), eleven circumferential
weld depression imperfections along the wall height are altogether modeled, in which areas in the vicinity of the weld
depression is discretized with denser meshes. The nite element
meshes for the reference silo with weld imperfections are plotted
in Fig. 5.

(1) LBAlinear elastic bifurcation analysis of the perfect silo;

(2) GNAgeometrically nonlinear elastic analysis of the perfect
silo;
(3) GMNAgeometrically and materially nonlinear analysis of the
perfect silo;
(4) GNIAgeometrically nonlinear elastic analysis of the imperfect silo;
(5) GMNIAgeometrically and materially nonlinear analysis of the
imperfect silo.
4. Numerical results and discussions of the reference silo
4.1. Geometry of the reference silo
In the present analyses, buckling behavior is rstly investigated
for a at-bottomed steel silo with tapered wall thickness. For
various reasons, silo walls are constructed in a diversity of forms
known as the uniform thickness, the stepwise thickness, and the
tapered thickness. The thickness forms and distribution over wall
height has been proved to have signicant inuence on buckling
behavior of silos under axial compression and external pressures.
Previous research has been focused on walls of uniform thickness,
and the results accordingly are of limited application. The tapered
wall thickness for the reference silo is preferred because of its
better structural performance and economy in cost, which would

Fig. 5. FE meshes for reference silo with weld imperfection.

342

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

4.2. General buckling behavior of the reference silo

Both the linear bifurcation and nonlinear buckling analysis is
carried out for the reference silo in this section. The buckling load
factor is determined by an amplication factor applied to the
design values of the combination of actions for Load Case WE and
Load Case WF. The linear buckling analysis predicts the theoretical
buckling strength (the bifurcation point) of an ideal linear elastic
structure, while in the nonlinear buckling analysis, the arc-length
solution technique is used to follow the structural loaddisplacement full course responses for both geometrically perfect and
imperfect models. The loaddisplacement curves are plotted in
Figs. 6 and 7 for various analysis types of the reference silo which
is calculated by selecting the monitoring node in the windward
meridian at the critical buckling point. The vertical axis is the load
factor being applied to the design value of combinational actions,
while the horizontal axis represents the out-of-plane radial displacement normalized by the equivalent thickness teq of the silo
wall. It could be observed that the loaddisplacement curves
predict a distinct maximum load followed by a descending path,
in which the maximum load is taken as the critical buckling point
cr for the equilibrium path.
In the Load Case of WE, the load factor initially increases
linearly with the increasing radial displacement in the range of
approximate 0.1teq before the critical point cr is reached, and the
equilibrium paths of the two groups of FE model for perfect (see
Fig. 6, GNA and GMNA) and imperfect shell wall (see Fig. 6, GNIA
and GMNIA) are almost coincident in each plotting. Once the

5.0
LBA

4.0

GNA

GNIA

3.0

GMNIA

GMNA

2.0
1.0
0.0
0.0

-0.5

-1.0

-1.5

-2.0

w/teq
Fig. 6. Typical loaddisplacement curves for various analysis types in Load Case WE.

2.5

critical buckling point cr is got across, the monitoring point

suddenly turns into a large radial deection indicating the shift of
the equilibrium path to the postbuckling stage. The equilibrium
path subsequently descends slightly and reaches a plateau. The load
factors from the perfect (GNA and GMNA) or imperfect (GNIA and
GMNIA) shell are almost identical in each group when account is
taken for the material nonlinearity. It is indicated that the buckling
resistance is almost independent of the material nonlinearity in
Load Case WE. The equilibrium path of imperfect shell (GNIA and
GMNIA) in Fig. 6 shows a 21% decrease of the buckling resistance
factor R in comparison to that of the perfect shell (GNA and GMNA)
in the same plotting, which means the buckling resistance, is much
sensitive to weld imperfection in Load Case WE.
When it comes to Load Case WF, the buckling behavior showed
by Fig. 7 is much different. The equilibrium paths display a much
wider range of radial displacement of about 1.0teq than that in Load
Case WE, within which the loaddisplacement curve keeps linear. It
suggests that an evident increase of strength to sustain radial
deection gains. Both the material nonlinearity and geometrical
nonlinearity effect is strong and detrimental to buckling behavior of
steel silos, resulting in decrease of buckling resistance. The equilibrium paths of imperfect shell (GNIA and GMNIA) in Fig. 7 shows a
12.5% and 7.5% respective decrease of the critical buckling point cr
in comparison to that of the perfect shell (GNA and GMNA) in the
same plotting. When account is taken of the material nonlinerity,
the critical buckling point plotted in Fig. 7 shows a decrease of 46%
and 43% respectively (GMNA and GMNIA) in contrast with that from
the linear elastic model (GNA and GNIA).
The load carrying capacity of buckling is characterized by the
buckling resistance factor R, which is proposed by EN 1993-1-6
[7], when checking the buckling limit state. For clarity of terminology, the buckling resistance factor R is referred to the critical
buckling point cr which distinguishes the prebuckling stage from
the postbuckling stage determined from the loaddisplacement
equilibrium path. The buckling resistance factor R is rearranged
and plotted in Fig. 8 for various analysis types of the reference silo
(h/d 0.9, r/teq 800) in Load Case WE and WF. It is indicated that
the buckling resistance factor R in the Load Case WE for the
reference wind velocity is much higher than that in Load Case WF
for the same buckling analysis. This means that the buckling
design is most likely to be governed by Load Case WF in the
presence of the wind velocity of 20 m/s for the reference silo. One
could also discover from Fig. 8 that the GMNIA analysis gives out
the least results in both Load Case WE and WF from all proposed
buckling analysis types. The minimum buckling resistance factor is
about 1.12 from GMNIA in Load Case WF, which exactly satisfy the
overall safety factor M1 proposed by EN1993-4-1 [2]. In addition,
the load factor from LBA is also presented as the critical buckling
point in Fig. 8 which is obtained from the lowest Eigenvalue. The
5.0

LBA

WE

GNA

2.0

WF

4.0

GNIA

1.5
3.0

1.0

GMNA

2.0

GMNIA

0.5
1.0

0.0
0.0

1.0

2.0

3.0

4.0

w/teq
Fig. 7. Typical loaddisplacement curves for various analysis types in Load Case WF.

0.0

LBA

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

Fig. 8. Buckling resistance factor R of the reference silo for various analysis types.

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

buckling resistance factor from GNA analysis is approximately

equal to that from LBA analysis in both Load Cases, which indicates
that large deformation makes a trivial change to the geometry of
shell and results in little loss of the buckling strength.
The buckling deformations shown in Figs. 9 and 10 correspond
to the critical buckling points of the loaddisplacement curves
plotted in Figs. 6 and 7 for Load Case WE and WF, where different scale factors are used in plotting the buckling modes for
better visualization of the deformation. The buckling deformation

LBA

corresponding to the critical point cr in Load Case WE is governed

by the meridional and circumferential compression which is generated in the windward region of the shells having well conspicuous circumferential waves localized at the top part of silo wall.
The nonlinear buckling deformations agree well with the buckling
mode predicted by the linear bifurcation result.
The buckling modes in Load Case WF shift into the well-known
elephant-foot deformation at the bottom part of the shell wall,
which is induced by the meridional compressive stress. In such

GNA

GMNA

343

GNIA

GMNIA

Fig. 9. Buckling modes of the reference silo for Load Case WE.

LBA

GNA

GMNA

GNIA

GMNIA

Fig. 10. Buckling modes of the reference silo for Load Case WF.

344

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

case, the vertical frictional pressure acting on the internal surface

of silo wall becomes predominant to the buckling deformation.
The buckling modes predicted by GMNA is slightly different from
that predicted by other types of buckling analyses, which is
characterized by nothing more than one meridional wave at
the shell bottom, while several meridional waves with assorted
magnitudes can be found in other types of buckling analyses. The
unsymmetrical wind pressure seems to have little impact on the
buckling deformation for a full silo, in which the buckling mode is
approximately axisymmetrical induced by the symmetrical pressure exerted by the stored bulk solid. The wind pressure acting on
the external surface of silo wall is much smaller compared to the
pressures exerted by granular solids acting on internal surface of silo
wall. The positive wind pressure in the windward region is counterbalanced by part of the solid pressures and the negative wind
suction is integrated with the solid pressures.

4.5
4.0
3.5

GMNIA

2.5

R
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
20

5. Parametric analyses

40

60

m/s

wind velocity vb
3.0
2.5

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

2.0

R 1.5
1.0
0.5
0.0

5.1. Wind velocity

Buckling design in case of an empty silo is generally dominated
by the wind pressure acting on external surface of silo wall. In the
preceding analyses, wind pressure for the reference silo is determined by assuming a basic wind velocity vb of 20 m/s, corresponding to a maximum wind pressure 0.806 kN/m2 acting on the top
and at the windward generator of silo wall. In most practical design
of silo, the basic wind velocity vb is nevertheless far beyond 20 m/s
compared with meteorological data from site survey [2628]. The
buckling resistance factor R is plotted in Fig. 11 for various basic
wind velocities in both Load Case WE and WF. It is shown that the
variations of basic wind velocity, in the Load Case WE, have much
inuence on buckling resistance factor R and would dominate the
buckling design. The buckling resistance factor R from the GMNIA
(or GNIA) analysis decreases from 3.25 to 1.11 (reduced by 65.8%)
when the basic wind velocity vb increases from 20 m/s to 40 m/s,
and the factor R for vb of 60 m/s continually drops and reduced by
76.9% by contrast with that from vb of 20 m/s. When Load Case WF
for a full silo is considered, the buckling resistance factor R is
reduced by 5.3% and 7.1% for the basic wind velocity vb 40 m/s and
60 m/s respectively, in comparison to that from vb of 20 m/s, as is
shown in Fig. 11. It is indicated that the wind pressure on external
surface of silo has limited inuence on buckling behavior when the
silo is full lled with bulk solids.
It is also indicated in Fig. 11 that the GMNIA results give out the
least buckling resistance factor in both Load Cases WE and WF
from all proposed buckling analysis types. The buckling design of

GNIA

GMNA

3.0

0.0

The buckling behavior discussed in the above section is derived

for the reference silo with given geometry and specied loading
conditions which could be deemed as the representative of the
squat silos. Nevertheless, other relevant parameters, such as the
loading conditions including the wind velocity, the patch load, and
the geometry parameters including the aspect ratio, the radius-tothickness ratio, the wall section (uniform, stepped, or tapered
wall), the wall openings etc, are actually variant and validated to
have signicant impact on buckling behavior of steel silos from the
viewpoint of practical design. Since the linear bifurcation analysis
makes no allowance for geometrical or material nonlinearity to
which buckling behavior of steel silo is conrmed to be quite
sensitive, the results from the LBA analysis could not be justied as
a reliable evaluation for the practical design of silo structures. The
parametric studies in nonlinear buckling analyses (GNA, GNIA,
GMNA, and GMNIA) are consequently carried out for the reference
silo from the perspective of practicality.

GNA

20

40
wind velocity vb

60

m/s

Fig. 11. Buckling resistance factor for various wind velocities (h/d 0.9, r/teq 800,
Tratio 0.25). (a, b) Load case.

the reference silo is demonstrated by the previous studies to be

governed by Load Case WF for a basic wind velocity vb of 20 m/s.
But the buckling design of silo may be governed by Load Case WE
for an empty silo, if the basic wind velocity vb is continuously
increased. The buckling resistance factor R from the GMNIA
analysis and in Load Case WE for a basic wind velocity vb of
40 m/s is about 1.11 which is approximately equal to that from the
GMNIA in Load Case WF. It is worth notice that the factor R from
the GMNIA analysis and in Load Case WE for a basic wind velocity
vb of 60 m/s is far below that in Load Case WF. It could be
concluded that buckling design in Load Case WE and WF depends
greatly on the wind velocity. A critical basic wind velocity vb,cr is
found to be about 40 m/s for the reference silo, which would tell
the buckling design from the dominant Load Case WF to dominant
Load Case WE. That is to say, the buckling design would be
governed by Load Case WE for a basic wind velocity vb greater
than vb,cr of 40 m/s and would be governed by Load Case WF for vb
less than vb,cr.
5.2. Aspect ratio
Silos with large capacities are usually squat and stocky. The
buckling behavior of steel silos with aspect ratio h/d ranging from

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

20
GNA
GMN A

15

GNIA
GMNIA

345

following fact that the meridional compressive stress in the silo

wall results with the depth from the accumulation of the frictional
pressure exerted from the stored granular solid, so that the
buckling stress is substantially increased towards the base of the
silo when the height of silo wall increases.
5.3. Radius-to-thickness ratio

R 10

0.5

0.7

0.9

1.1

h/d

6.0
GNA
GMN A

4.5

GNIA
GMNI A

The effects of radius-to-thickness ratio r/teq ranging from 500 to

1000 on buckling resistance factor R are explored, as is shown in
Fig. 13. The buckling resistance factor R decreases greatly with the
increasing r/teq ratio in each analysis type, which shows great
inuence of r/teq ratio on the buckling behavior of steel silos. In
Load Case WE, the factor R in both GNA and GNIA analysis for r/teq
ratio of 500 is about 3.1 times that of the reference silo (r/
teq 800), but the result for r/teq ratio of 1000 is reduced by about
43% in comparison to that of the reference silo. It is also revealed
in the Fig. 13 that the results from GNA (or GNIA) analysis are
almost identical to that from GMNA (or GMNIA) analysis implying
little inuences of material nonlinearity on buckling resistance of
silo for diversity of r/teq ratios. In Load Case WF, both the
geometrical and material nonlinearity have detrimental inuence
on buckling resistance of silo, where the factor R from the GMNIA

14.0

R 3.0

GNA
GMNA

12.0

1.5

GNIA
GMNIA

10.0
8.0

0.0

0.5

0.7

0.9

1.1

R
6.0

h/d
Fig. 12. Buckling resistance factor for various aspect ratios (r/teq 800, Tratio 0.25).
(a, b) Load case.

0.5 to 1.1 is investigated in Load Case WE and WF in this section, as

is shown in Fig. 12. The buckling resistance factor R decreases
greatly with the increasing aspect ratio h/d in each analysis type,
which shows great inuence of aspect ratio on the buckling
behavior of steel silos.
In Load Case WE, the GMNIA analysis for aspect ratio h/d of
0.5 presents a buckling resistance factor R which is about 5.3 times
that of the reference silo (h/d 0.9), but the results for h/d of
1.1 shows a reduction about 8.5% compared to that of the reference
silo. This suggests that the buckling resistance of an empty silo
under wind pressure increases greatly with the decrease of
the aspect ratio h/d. The benecial effect originates mainly from
the following two factors: the distribution of wind pressure on
external surface of silo wall is specied by the reference height ze
[5] which is regarded as the maximum height of the designed steel
silos, thus the positive wind pressure on the windward meridian
decreases from 0.806 kN/m2 to 0.703 kN/m2 on the one hand, on
the other hand, the lateral stiffness to wind pressure multiples for
silo structure with an invariant radius-to-thickness ratio when the
aspect ratio decreases from 0.9 to 0.5.
In Load Case WF, the buckling resistance factor R for aspect
ratio h/d of 0.5 from the GMNIA analysis is about 55% higher than
that obtained from the reference silo (h/d 0.9), but the results for
h/d of 1.1 shows a reduction about 21.5% compared to that of the
reference silo. This suggests that the buckling resistance of a full
silo under wind pressure decreases greatly with the increase of the
aspect ratio h/d. The unfavorable effect originates mainly from the

4.0
2.0
0.0

500

800

1000

r/teq

6.0

GNA
GMNA

5.0

GNIA
GMNIA

4.0

3.0
2.0
1.0
0.0

500

800

1000

r/teq
Fig. 13. Buckling resistance factor for various r/teq ratios (h/d 0.9, Tratio 0.25).
(a, b) Load case.

346

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

analysis has the least value in each r/teq ratio. The factor R in
GMNIA analysis for r/teq ratio of 500 is about 1.7 times that of the
reference silo, while the result from r/teq ratio of 1000 is reduced
by about 28% with respect to that of the reference silo.

8.0

Taper
Group B

Group A
Uniform

6.0
5.4. Stepped and uniform wall thickness
The preceding investigation is carried out by assuming that the
wall thickness of steel silo is tapered from the bottom to the top.
This assumption is theoretically ideal, whereas silo strakes with
different thicknesses are joined with welds to construct the
complete structure in most practical engineering, forming the
so-called stepped wall thickness. So that it is of great signicance
to perform buckling analysis of silo structures with stepped wall
thickness. The buckling behavior of steel silo with stepped wall
thickness is evaluated in this section. The results will also be
compared with that from the tapered and uniform wall thickness
under the circumstances that the three types of wall section share
the same equivalent thickness teq equal to 25 mm and have the
same aspect ratio h/d of 0.9. In the case of the stepped wall silo, the
equivalent thickness teq is dened in the following form (Eq. (6)),
which is deemed as an economic index meaning equal steel
consumption in the three types of wall thickness.
t eq

hi t i
hi

in which, hi and ti is the height and thickness of the ith wall strake.
For the convenience of comparison, two groups of thickness for
stepped wall are designated, as are noted Group A and B in Table 3
with thickness ranging from top strake t1 to bottom strake t12.
The effects of different types of silo wall thickness on buckling
resistance factor R are demonstrated in Fig. 14 for diverse buckling
analysis types. In Load Case WE, the factor R from the uniform
wall thickness has the most numerical value among them, which is
approximate 2.0 times that from the least results of the stepped
wall thickness (Group B) in the GNA and GNIA analysis. It is also
indicated that material nonlinearity has little impact on the
buckling behavior of the reference silo in various types of wall
thickness. Whereas it is reversed in Load Case WF, the factor R
from the uniform wall thickness has the least numerical value,
which is only 0.52 time that from the stepped wall thickness
(Group A) in the GMNIA analysis (reduced by 48%). Further
scrutinizing Fig. 14a and b show that the buckling resistance factor
for stepped wall thickness (Group A) obtains the largest value in
Load Case WF and meanwhile satises the design requirement in
Load Case WE. As a result, the thickness arrangement scheme:
Group A is the optimal one of all.
The buckling deformation in Load Case WE for an empty silo
primarily arises at the windward meridian of the upper region (see
Fig. 9), while it arises at the lower region in the Load Case WF (see
Fig. 10). The uniform wall thickness of 25 mm is the largest at the
upper region and the smallest in the lower region among the three
thickness types. This could explain why the buckling resistance
factor R for a uniform thickness silo is the largest in Load Case WE
but the smallest in Load Case WF. Some structural measures could
be taken, such as thicken the wall section in the upper or lower
region, in order to enhance the buckling resistance to the wind
pressurized empty or full lled silos. Under the condition of the
Table 3
Groups of stepped wall thickness.
Thickness

t1

t2

t3

t4

t5

t6

t7

t8

t9

t10

t11

t12

teq

Group A
Group B

8
6

10
8

12
10

16
16

20
24

24
28

28
28

30
32

36
32

36
36

40
40

40
40

25
25

R 4.0

2.0

0.0

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

2.5

Taper
Group B

2.0

Group A
Uniform

1.5

R
1.0

0.5

0.0

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

Fig. 14. Buckling resistance factor for various types of wall thicknesses (h/d 0.9,
r/teq 800, teq 25 mm). (a, b) Load case.

same material consumption, different schemes for wall thickness

arrangement is suggested to be lay out and selections are supposed to be made in buckling design of steel silos to achieve the
optimal buckling strength.
5.5. Patch load
Large steel silo has often been advised to be concentrically
lled and discharged to avoid the unsymmetric patch load on the
wall if at all possible. However, patch load resulting from the
eccentric lling and discharge is difcult to avoid due to many
practical considerations, such as the opening, multiple outlets, the
segregation of stored solids, the ease of access, etc. The effects of
patch loads have been found to be very detrimental to buckling
strength of slender silos, but their effects on squat silos are
commonly deemed to be quite small or even ignored by EN
1991-4 [1]. In spite of the above existing regulations, the quantitative analysis has not been carried out, on the one hand, to
discover the extent to which the inuence of patch load on bulking
behavior of large squat silos could be left out; on the other hand
the unsymmetrical patch load on the large steel silo is inevitable
during lling or discharging of the stored bulk solids, which
should be considered to act on any part of the silo wall. In the
viewpoint of safe design, the effects of patch load on buckling
resistance factor R are investigated for various patch load positions hp (the height from the base of the silo wall to the center of
the patch load, see Fig. 3) for the reference silo in this section.
Buckling analyses in form of four types (GNA, GNIA, GMNA,
GMNIA) are undertaken by comparing two groups of wall

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

pressures: one for the reference silo subject to the symmetrical

solids pressure (dened by Eqs. (2) and (3)) plus the eccentric
lling patch load acting in several typical height hp (hp 0.2h, 0.4h,
0.6h and 0.8h) and the other for the reference silo subject to only
the symmetrical solids pressure. The non-symmetrical patch load
ppfs takes the form of cosine relation with the circumferential
angle , which is taken to act over a height s, but to extend from a
maximum outward pressure on one side of pp to an inward
pressure pp on the opposite side, as is plotted in Fig. 3. The lling
path load ppfs is assumed to be 0.2phfcos() proposed by EN 19914 [8], in which is the patch load magnier 1 4.0e/d, and e is
the maximum lling eccentricity e0.25d. In the above expression

2.5

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

2.0

1.5

R
1.0

0.5

347

of ppfs, the patch loads around the circumferential direction also

possess only one axis of symmetry, so the patch load is assumed to
share the same symmetric axis with the wind pressure in the FE
analyses.
The results are illustrated in Fig. 15 which shows that the effect
of patch load on buckling behavior of the reference squat silo is
relatively small. It is shown that the buckling resistance factor R in
GNA and GNIA analysis makes not much discrepancy for hp
ranging from 0.2h to 0.8h, which is reduced by a ratio less than
4% in comparison to that of silo subject to only symmetrical
pressure. The GMNIA analysis for patch load position hp of 0.2h
presents the least buckling resistance factor R with a reduction of
18.7% with respect to that of silo without the patch load. In
addition, the patch load position hp has certain effect on the factor
R, which is a little larger for patch load acting on the higher height
of silo (e.g., hp 0.8h, with a reduction of 9.8% in GMNIA analysis)
than that on the lower position (e.g., hp 0.2h). The bulking results
conrms the validity of the design concept proposed by EN 1991-4
[1] that For squat silos in all Action Assessment Classes, the lling
patch load need not be considered..
The deformations corresponding to the critical buckling point
are plotted in Fig. 16 for the reference silo with patch load height
hp of 0.6h. The buckling mode in each analysis type is similar to
that for silo without patch load shown in Fig. 10 except that the
unsymmetrical deformation in the position which the patch load
acts is distinctly observed, which is concave in the positive patch
load region and convex in the negative patch load region.
5.6. Opening

0.0

Without
patch load

0.2h

0.4h

0.6h

0.8h

hp
Fig. 15. Buckling resistance factor for various patch load positions in Load Case WF
(h/d 0.9, r/teq 800, Tratio 0.25).

GNA

GMNA

Squat silos with large capacities are often ground-supported

with a great deal of outlets designed at the at bottom for the
discharge of the granular solids. During the discharge, some stored
solids in the corner of silo which are far enough from the outlet
could not be discharged in the normal way, giving rise to the

GNIA

GMNIA

Fig. 16. Buckling modes with patch load height hp of 0.6h for various analysis types (Load Case: WF, h/d 0.9, r/teq 800, Tratio 0.25).

348

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

obsolete material at the silo bottom. In order to clear out the

obsolete material, the silo wall, as a rule, is equipped with
rectangular openings at the bottom for the convenience of the
entrance and exit of the clearing machine.
In this section, attention is focused on the effects of large
openings in the wall on buckling resistance of silo. The opening in
the wall makes the distribution of the stress and deformation
discontinue, resulting in the stress concentration at the opening
corner, and the decrease of the buckling resistance of the silo wall.
Usually, Openings in the wall of the silo are reinforced by the
vertical and horizontal stiffeners adjacent to the opening which
could decrease the corner concentrated stress on the one hand,
and enhance the buckling strength of silo to avoid local instability
of silo wall on the other hand. The opening in the analysis is
assumed to be rectangular with a common dimension of 4.0 m
width and 6.0 m height. The schematic drawing of stiffener
arrangement adjacent to the opening is shown in Fig. 17, where
the Box section B300  200  14 is used for longitudinal stiffeners and the Box section B200  150  10 is used for transverse
stiffeners.
The results are presented in Fig. 18a and b for Load Case WE
and WF. In Load Case WE, the buckling resistance factor R for silo
wall with opening and without stiffener is reduced by about 3%
with respect to that for silo wall without opening in GMNIA
analysis, while the factor is almost equal to that of silo with
opening and stiffener. It is indicated that the bottom opening show
little inuence on the buckling behavior of wind pressurized
empty silo, by reason that the buckling deformation in Load Case
WE arise mainly in the upper area of the windward meridian, as is
shown in Fig. 9. In Load Case WF, the buckling resistance factor R
for silo wall with opening and stiffener is approximately equal to
that of silo without opening, while the fact for silo wall with
opening and without stiffener is reduced by about 25% with
respect to that for silo wall without opening in GMNIA analysis.
Similar conclusions could also be drawn from other types of
buckling analyses. It is indicated that the bottom opening show
much inuence on the buckling behavior of a full silo, by reason
that the buckling deformation in Load Case WF arise mainly in the
lower area of the silo wall, as is shown in Fig. 10. The lost of

2.0
2.0
longitudinal stiffener

2.0

opening

2.0

(4.0x6.0)

4.0

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

4.0

3.0

R
2.0

1.0

0.0
Without
opening

Opening without
stiffener

Opening with
stiffener

2.5

2.0

GNA

GNIA

GMNA

GMNIA

1.5

R
1.0

0.5

0.0

Without
openning

Opening without
stiffener

Opening with
stiffener

Fig. 18. Buckling resistance factor for silos with bottom opening (h/d 0.9, r/teq
800, Tratio 0.25). (a, b) Load case.

buckling resistance induced by the bottom opening could be

compensated for by the reinforcement of stiffeners adjacent to
the opening.

transverse stiffener

1.5

5.0

1.5

Fig. 17. Schematic drawing of stiffener arrangement for bottom opening (unit: m).

6. Conclusions
This paper has presented a comprehensive study of the buckling behavior of large circular steel silos subject to wind pressure.
The analyses are demonstrated in accordance with Eurocode, by
considering two working stages of silos in their service life which
is closely relating to wind pressures: Load Case WE (wind and
empty silo) and Load Case WF (wind and full silo). The following
conclusions can be drawn from these investigations:
(1) The buckling behavior in Load Case WE, is almost independent of the material nonlinearity, while the buckling resistance and buckling mode is much sensitive to weld
imperfection. In Load Case WF, both the material nonlinearity
and geometrical nonlinearity effect is strong and detrimental
to buckling behavior of steel silos, resulting in decrease of
buckling resistance.
(2) The buckling deformation corresponding to the critical point
in Load Case WE is governed by the meridional and circumferential compression which is generated in the windward
region of the shells having conspicuous circumferential

Y. Zhao et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 73 (2013) 337349

(3)

(4)

(5)

(6)

waves localized at the top part of silo wall. The buckling

mode in Load Case WF takes the form of the well-known
elephant-foot deformation at the bottom part of the shell
wall, which is induced by the meridional compressive stress.
Buckling design of steel silo considering Load Case WE and
WF depends greatly on the wind velocity. The buckling
design of steel silo is governed by Load Case WF for a
relatively low wind velocity, while it may be governed by
Load Case WE for an empty silo, if the wind velocity is
continuously increased.
Buckling behavior of steel silo subject to wind pressure varies
greatly with the variation of aspect ratio h/d and the radiusto-thickness ratio r/teq. The buckling resistance of steel silo
under wind pressure increases greatly with the decrease of
the aspect ratio h/d and the ratio r/teq.
The type of wall thickness arrangement plays an important
role in buckling behavior of steel silo. Under the condition of
the same material consumption, the reasonable thickness
arrangement is recommended to be laid out and selections
are supposed to be taken in buckling design of steel silos to
achieve the optimal buckling strength.
The bottom opening shows little inuence on the buckling
behavior of an empty silo subject to wind pressure. Whereas,
the effects of bottom opening on a full lled silo is fairly
obvious, and the lost of buckling resistance induced by the
opening could be compensated for by the reinforcement of
stiffeners adjacent to the opening.

Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the National
Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51378459 and No.
50778159) and the Key Science and Technology Innovation Team
Program of Zhejiang Province, China (No. 2010R50034).
References
[1] EN 1991-4. Actions on structuresPart 4: Silos and tanks. European Standard;
2006.
[2] EN 1993-4-1. Design of steel structuresPart 4-1: silos. European Standard;
2007.
[3] EN 1990. Basis of structural design. European Standard; 2002.
[4] EN 1991-1-1. Actions on structures-Part 1-1: general actions: densities,
self-weight, imposed loads for buildings. European Standard; 2002.
[5] EN 1991-1-4. Actions on structuresPart 14: general actions-Part 1-4, wind
actions. European Standard; 2005.
[6] EN 1993-1-1. Design of steel structuresPart 1-1: general rules and rules for
buildings. European Standard; 2005.

349

[7] EN 1993-1-6. Design of steel structures-Part 16: strength and stability of

shell structures. European standard; 2007.
[8] EN 1991-4. Basis of design and actions on structures-Part 4: actions in silos
and tanks. European standard; 1996.
[9] Macdonald PA, Kwok KCS, Holmes JD. Wind loads on circular storage bins,
silos and tanks: I. Point pressure measurements on isolated structures. Journal
of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics 1988;31:16588.
[10] Purdy DM, Maher PE, Frederick D. Model studies of wind loads on at-top
cylinders. Journal of the Structural Division, ASCE 1967;93:37995.
[11] Sabransky IJ, Melbourne WH. Design pressure distribution on circular silos
with conical roofs. Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics
1987;26:6584.
[12] Portela G, Godoy LA. Wind pressures and buckling of cylindrical steel tanks
with a conical roof. Journal of Construction Steel Research 2005;61(6):
786807.
[13] Portela G, Godoy LA. Wind pressures and buckling of cylindrical steel tanks
with a dome roof. Journal of Construction Steel Research 2005;61(6):80824.
[14] Chen Lei, Michael Rotter J. Buckling of anchored cylindrical shells of uniform
thickness under wind load. Engineering Structures 2012;41:199208.
[15] Chen L, Rotter JM, Doerich C. Buckling behaviour of cylindrical shells of
stepwise wall thickness under uniform external pressure. Engineering Structures 2011;33(12):35708.
[16] Sosa Eduardo M, Godoy Luis A. Challenges in the computation of lower-bound
buckling loads for tanks under wind pressures. Thin-walled Structures 2010;48:
93545.
[17] Schneider W, Zahlten W. Load-bearing behaviour and structural analysis of
slender ring-stiffened cylindrical shells under quasi-static wind load. Journal
of Construction Steel Research 2004;60:12546.
[18] Kundurpi PS, Savamedam G, Johns DJ. Stability of cantilever shells under
wind loads. Journal of the Engineering Mechanics Division, ASCE 1975;10(5):
51730.
[19] Johns DJ. Wind-induced static instability of cylindrical shells. Journal of Wind
Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics 1983;13:26170.
[20] Uematsu Y, Uchiyama K. Deection and buckling behavior of thin, circular
cylindrical shells under wind loads. Journal of Wind Engineering and
Industrial Aerodynamics 1985;18:24561.
[21] Jerath S, Sadid H. Buckling of orthotropic cylinders due to wind load. Journal of
Engineering Mechanics, ASCE 1985;111(5):61022.
[22] Schmidt H, Binder B, Lange H. Postbuckling strength design of open thinwalled cylindrical tanks under wind load. Thin-walled Structures 1998;31:
20320.
[23] Greiner R, Derler P. Effect of imperfections on wind-loaded cylindrical shells.
Thin-walled Structures 1995;23:27181.
[24] Godoy LA, Flores FG. Imperfection sensitivity to elastic buckling of wind loaded
open cylindrical tanks. Structural Engineering and Mechanics 2002;13(5):
53342.
[25] Pircher M. The inuence of a weld-induced axi-symmetric imperfection on
the buckling of a medium-length silo under wind loading. Journal of Solids
and Structures 2004;41:5595610.
[26] Jaca Rossana C, Godoy Luis A. Wind buckling of metal tanks during their
construction. Thin-walled Structures 2010;48:4539.
[27] Flores FG, Godoy LA. Buckling of short tanks due to hurricanes. Engineering
Structures 1998;20(8):75260.
[28] Godoy LA. Performance of storage tanks in oil facilities following Hurricanes
Katrina and Rita. Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities, ASCE
2007;21(6):4419.
[29] Pavlovic P, et al. The testing and repair of steel silo. Construction and Building
Materials 1997;11:35363.
[30] ANSYS. ANSYS user's manual. Houston: Swanson Analysis Systems Inc.; 2008.
[31] Rotter JM, Teng JG. Elastic stability of cylindrical shells with weld depressions.
Journal of Structural Engineering, ASCE 1989;115(5):124463.