Application of response surface method for reliability analysis of stiffened laminated plates

The practicability of structural reliability analysis methods for a specific limit state depends to a great extent on the complexities of the formulation of the limit-state function. Often the limit-state function is not available in the explicit form. One way to solve the problem is to approximate a limit-state surface in a numerical form by regression. Once the response surface has been obtained, the reliability analysis is made with the response surface as limit-state surface in place of the complicated limit-state surface of the model. An application methodology for structural reliability analysis of the composite structures based on the response surface method in conjunction with nonlinear finite-element analysis is demonstrated in this paper. With the fitted response surface obtained, further developments for defining partial safety factors for composite design purpose are now possible