Ocean Systems Engineering, Vol. 1, No. 3 (2011) 223-239 223 FEA of the blast loading effect on ships hull Muhsin Hamdoon * 1 , Nader Zamani 1 and Sreekanta Das 2 1 Dept. of Mechanical, Automotive, and Materials Engineering, University of Windsor, Windsor, Canada 2 Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Windsor, Windsor, Canada (Received April 14, 2011, Revised August 31, 2011, Accepted September 3, 2011) Abstract. In combat operations, naval ships may be subjected to considerable air blast and underwater shock loads capable of causing severe structural damage. As the experimental study imposes great monetary and time cost, the numerical solution may provide a valuable alternative. This study emphasises on numerical analysis for optimization of stiffened and unstiffened plate’s structural response subjected to air blast load. Linear and non linear finite element (FE) modeling and analysis was carried out and compared with existing experimental results. The obtained results reveal a good agreement between numerical and experimental observations. The presented FE models can eliminate confusion regarding parameters selection and FE operations processing, using commercial software available currently. Keywords: stiffened/unstiffened plate; blast loading; ship hull; dynamic response; Explicit/Implicit schemes. 1. Introduction Steel members such as I-beam, angle, channel, and other sections are usually connected to steel plates to build stiffened steel plates. Stiffened and unstiffened steel plates are used in ship hulls and decks as well as many other structural applications such as bridge plate girders and offshore platforms. In modern warfare, naval ships could be subjected to considerable air blast and underwater shock loads. Blast load is a very high load mode applied within short time period in pressure form to structures as a result of explosions. For effective warship design against air blast and underwater shock threats, a fundamental and detailed understanding of shock wave loading and the associated structural response is required. In this study, the FEA results are compared with the experimental data found by the Defence Research Establishment Suffield (DRES) in Canada. The commercial software utilized in this study provided sufficient features in the numerical analysis. In the same time, comparison between FE and experimental results proofed the targeted software consistency to this type of problems. There is a considerable literature for this research area may be reported here starting by Houlston and Slater work (Houlston and Slater 1985a, b, 1991, 1993). Houlston and Slater conducted twelve tests on square unstiffened plates experimentally and published the data of two of them (1 and 4). Test 1 was analysed statically and dynamically, while Test 4 analysed dynamically. Subsequently, they carried out numerical analyses using ADINA software. *Corresponding author, PhD candidate, E-mail: mhamdoon@uwindsor.ca DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.12989/ose.2011.1.3.223