Buckling and post-buckling behaviour of extruded aluminium panels subject to the combined effects of welding and pitting corrosion

The present study investigates the effects of pitting corrosion and welding, both independently and combined, on the buckling and post-buckling behaviour of extruded aluminium panels. For this purpose, a finite element model of an aluminium panel made of AA6082-T6 extruded profiles is first developed without having the pitting corrosion and welding effects considered. Then, this finite element model is upgraded to account for the welding effects. This is followed by the validation of the upgraded model against the experimental data obtained from the literature. After the model validation, a hierarchical stochastic algorithm is utilised to simulate the pitting corrosion attack as geometrical defects distributed on the surface of both finite element models, with and without the welding-induced imperfections. Two different corrosion scenarios are considered. In the first scenario, the plating is corroded while the stiffeners remain intact. In the second scenario, the plating is intact, and the stiffeners contain pitting corrosion defects. The corroded parts are modelled with solid, hexahedral elements while shell elements are employed elsewhere. The effect of element type on the numerical results is discussed. Ultimately, the results obtained from the finite element models with and without corrosion and welding effects are compared in terms of ultimate strength, post-buckling response and stress/strain distribution.