Abstract

In the paper, Authors deals with viewport elements of underwater marine constructions. If a single-plate viewport constructions are considered, big thicknesses of the glass plate are required to resist the pressure. To build the viewports from the commercially accessible glass panes, multi-layered glass units are proposed in the paper. Numerical calculations are presented, summarized and compared with experimental tests. Focusing on their main idea, proposed viewports are inspired by the classical glass-lamination, but instead of gluing them with polyvinyl butyral, the glass panes are separated with deionized water that fills up all the hermetic inter-chambers formed by the panes. Heat-tempered mineral-glass panes are considered. Significant areas of the viewports are required. Performed numerical tests are addressed to verify statics, strength and stability of the proposed multi-layered innovative construction. Finite elements are used to create the models and to calculate the stress fields of all the glass elements of the viewports. Strengths of the investigated multi-layered units are estimated according to probabilistic theory of failure. Different constructional variants are tested for the viewports, including these made of flat and of curved glass panes. The final parameters of the optimal solution are not presented in the paper. The paper-presented examples certify however, that significant reduction of stresses is possible, especially of these occurring in the glass panes and, what follows, it certify that construction of underwater viewports of considerable dimensions is possible for viewports based on the standard thicknesses of the commercially accessible glass panes.

Authors (5)