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In this article, the static response of a functionally graded material (FGM) plate is studied via hybrid higher-order shear deformation theory which uses hyperbolic and polynomial shape functions and includes the effect of thickness stretching. The composition of the plate comprises metallic and ceramic phases. The ceramic volume fraction varies gradually along with the thickness following the power law. The mechanical properties of the FGM plate are determined by the rule of mixtures and the Mori–Tanaka homogenization scheme. The displacement fields are defined to satisfy the requirement of traction-free boundary conditions at the bottom and top surfaces of the plate surface removing the need for determination of shear correction factor. A C0 continuity FE model is developed for the present mathematical model. Nine-node isoparametric elements with eight nodal unknowns at each node are developed. The present model comparison with existing literature is completed and found to be coherent. Inhouse MATLAB code is developed for the present work. Sinusoidal and uniformly distributed loading is analyzed in the present work. The parametric study is undertaken to explore the effect of the side-to-thickness ratio, aspect ratio, thickness, and volume fraction index on stresses and transverse displacements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Failure mode prediction of laminated composite sandwich plates is presented using improved higher order shear deformation theory (IHSDT) mathematical model and its C0 finite element (FE) implementation in FORTRAN. The proposed 2D IHSDT satisfies the inter-laminar shear stress continuity at each adjacent layer and nil transverse shear stress conditions at top and bottom of the plate are imposed. The parabolic shear stress variation is piecewise across thickness of each layer; hence no need of shear correction factors. The possible modes of failures are transverse matrix cracking, fiber breakage and inter-fiber shear failure of the matrix. The failure mode along with its location for laminated composite sandwich plates are obtained and are found in good agreement with the available 3D elasticity results. • Failure analysis of laminated composite sandwich plate is done first time by IHSDT. • The efficient C0 finite element modeling based on IHSDT is coded in FORTRAN. • Present 2D IHSDT results are quite close to 3D elasticity results. • Present model predicts better transverse shear stresses than HSDT/FSDT. • Failure results laminated composite sandwich plates may be useful for designers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]