Wind pressures and buckling of cylindrical steel tanks with a conical roof

Tanks with a conical roof are studied in this paper under wind load, for a roof which is supported by rafters and columns. Buckling occurs in the form of deflections in the cylindrical shell and the buckling mode is localized in the windward region. Both bifurcation analysis and geometrically nonlinear analysis have been performed using finite element discretizations of the structure. The wind pressures have been obtained from wind tunnel experiments performed as part of the research, and have been obtained for tank geometries for which information was not previously available. The results show high imperfection sensitivity of tanks with a conical roof, and buckling loads for wind velocities in the same order as those expected to occur in the Caribbean region.