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Published on: November 14, 2015
How a curved elastic strip opens
Thomas Barois1, Loïc Tadrist2, Catherine Quilliet3
1Department of Mechanics, LadHyX, École Polytechnique-CNRS, 91128 Palaiseau, France and Université Grenoble Alpes, LEGI, F-38000 Grenoble, France CNRS, LEGI, F-38000 Grenoble, France.
Abstract:
An elastic strip is transversely clamped in a curved frame. The induced curvature decreases as the strip opens and connects to its flat natural shape. Various ribbon profiles are measured and the scaling law for the opening length validates a description where the in-plane stretching gradually relaxes the bending stress. An analytical model of the strip profile is proposed and a quantitative agreement is found with both experiments and simulations of the plates equations. This result provides a unique illustration of smooth nondevelopable solutions in thin sheets.
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