# failure point of flat panel under pressure

Generally, how would I go about finding the maximum distributed pressure which a flat rectangular panel of material, say glass or acrylic, can withstand given thickness, length, and width?

For example, a glass panel 10cm by 10cm by 1cm thick. How much pressure in Pa could the panel withstand before failing? Something like a door on a vacuum chamber.

• A lot more information is necessary. What are the boundary conditions (how is it supported on each side)? What is the material, specifically? Different types of glass behave very differently. – Wasabi Jun 16 '16 at 10:42

If you wanted to solve this from first principles (difficult - especially for rectangular plates) you would usually use Kirchhoff plate theory, which assumes small deflections ($\delta < t/2$) as well as some other simplifications.
The maximum stress in the plate is: $$\sigma_{max} = \frac{0.2874 q}{t^2}$$
where, $t$ is the thickness of the plate, $q$ is the load per unit area, and $\sigma_{max}$ is the maximum stress in the plate. If we take a very basic failure criteria of $\sigma_{max} = \sigma_{fail}$ then the applied load at failure is:
$$q_{max} = \frac{\sigma_{fail} t^2}{0.2874 }$$