Abstract:
Anticlastic glass plate is an important part of free-form glass facade, which can be realized by cold bending. In the cold bending process of glass plates, stability problems often occur before strength problems. This study first summarizes the instability phenomena that occurs during cold bending and defines the instability modes as bifurcation instability and cold bending distortion. To systematically study the stability of point-supported monolithic glass plates during anticlastic cold bending, finite element (FE) models are established to simulate the cold forming process and analyze the effects of various factors including supporting conditions, initial shape under gravity, loading directions, glass tempering, initial defects and geometric dimensions on point-supported monolithic glass plates. This research provides load and corner displacement formulas to describe the influence of geometric dimensions on stability. This study lays a foundation for realizing anticlastic glass plates through cold bending.