Composite anti-buckling structure for the corrugations of liquefied hydrogen containers

Corrugations are provided for metallic containers used to carry liquefied hydrogen to relieve thermal stresses generated due to large temperature difference between the room temperature and its liquefaction temperature. However, the corrugations of stainless steel (SUS) are vulnerable to failure due to the low pressure resisting capability of the corrugation when subjected to outside cavitation pressure. Since the pressure resisting capability of the corrugations has not been measured accurately due to the unavailability of test equipment, in this work, new test equipment has been developed, which can measure the pressure resisting capabilities of the SUS corrugations with the same boundary conditions of the actual system. The pressure resisting capabilities of the SUS corrugations reinforced with the aluminum anti-buckling structures were estimated with the finite element analysis, and compared to the measured ones. Also, anti-buckling glass fiber epoxy composite structures were developed and their pressure resisting capabilities were measured. Finally, the anti-buckling composite structure was optimized with respect to stacking sequence.