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This paper presents a numerical technique to determine the full pre-buckling and post-buckling equilibrium path for elastic funicular arches. The formulation includes the effects of shear deformations and geometric nonlinearity due to large deformations. The Timoshenko beam hypothesis is adopted for incorporating shear. Finite strains are considered without approximation. The finite strains are defined in terms of the normal and shear component of the longitudinal stretch. The constitutive relations for the internal actions are based on a hyperelastic constitutive model. Using the differential equilibrium equations and the constitutive laws, the nonlinear buckling behavior of some typical funicular arches are investigated using the trapezoid method with Richardson extrapolation enhancement. The results are validated by using the finite element package ANSYS and solutions available in the literature. Examples include parabolic arches under a uniformly distributed gravity load, a catenary under a distributed load along the arch and a catenary arch under an overburden load. Parametric studies are performed to identify the factors that influence the nonlinear buckling of funicular arches. The axial to shear rigidity ratio is shown to have a significant effect on the buckling load and the buckling mode shape.

Buckling loads of arches could be significantly affected by the assumptions made on the load behavior during buckling. For a funicular arch whose centerline coincides with the compression line, we may consider two types of load behaviors based on how the line of load action shifts during buckling. This paper presents the governing differential equations for the elastic in-plane buckling problem of funicular circular arches under uniform radial pressure based on the two different load behavior assumptions, as well as analytical and numerical methods for analysis. For the analytical method, buckling criteria of rotationally-restrained ended circular arches with an internal rotational spring are formulated by using the general solution of the governing differential equation. For the numerical method, the Hencky bar-chain model (HBM) and its simple matrix formulations for general funicular arches are established. The buckling loads and mode shapes of funicular circular arches are solved by using HBM and verified against exact solutions obtained from the analytical method. For funicular catenary arches and parabolic arches, the buckling load solutions by HBM with various number of segments are also obtained and compared with the solutions presented by the previous researchers.

This paper presents the optimal designs of pinned supported funicular arches under equally spaced point loads for maximum in-plane buckling load. Under such loading conditions, the funicular arch shapes comprise straight arch members between the point loads, that is, following the shape of the bending moment diagram of an equivalent simply supported beam under the same loading condition. Two classes of funicular arch optimization problems are considered herein. The first class of funicular arches imposes a constraint on the cross-sectional area to be uniform throughout the entire arch length. The second class of funicular arches allows the cross-sectional area to be different from one straight arch member to another member. To facilitate the buckling analysis, the Hencky bar-chain model (HBM) is adopted. This discrete structural model simplifies the optimization process as the decision variables are the HBM rotational spring stiffnesses that define the cross-sectional areas and the horizontal force that controls the arch shape. Presented herein are new optimal funicular arch shapes under various numbers of equally spaced point loads. By increasing the number of point loads, the optimal solution approaches the solution of a parabolic arch under a uniformly distributed load.

The out-of-plane buckling behavior of arches is closely related to the element torsional behavior. The traditional 12-degree-of-freedom second-order element stiffness matrix which uses a simplified element torsional stiffness GJ/$L$ (where $G$ is the shear modulus, $J$ the St. Venant torsion constant, $L$ the element length) may significantly underestimate the out-of-plane buckling loads of funicular arches. This paper presents a simple and effective exact matrix stiffness method (MSM) for the out-of-plane buckling analysis of funicular arches. The developed MSM uses a 14-degree-of-freedom second-order element stiffness matrix of three-dimensional beam-columns considering both torsion and warping deformations. The out-of-plane buckling analysis of funicular arches is performed by using the global structural stability stiffness matrix, which combines the transformed second-order element stiffness matrices. The proposed MSM with the exact 14-degree-of-freedom second-order element stiffness matrix for the out-of-plane buckling analysis is verified by comparing with some classical solutions of funicular circular and parabolic arches with box sections and I-sections. Further discussions show that the 14-degree-of-freedom second-order element stiffness matrix may be reduced to a simplified 12-degree-of-freedom form only by deriving the exact element torsional stiffnesses, which could be significantly larger than GJ/$L$ for members with large cross-sectional torsional stiffness parameters (especially open cross-sections).