experimental evaluation. Thus, it is extremely useful to use available experimental data of specific structural systems to predict the behavior of all similar systems. This study describes the establishment of similarity conditions between two structural systems. Similarity conditions provide the relationship between a scale model and its prototype, and can be used to predict the behavior of the prototype by extrapolating the experimental data of the corresponding small scale model. Since satisfying all the similarity conditions simultaneously is in most cases impractical, distorted models with partial similarity (with at least one similarity condition relaxed) are employed. Establishing similarity conditions, based on direct use of governing equations, is discussed and the possibility of designing distorted models is investigated. The method is demonstrated through analysis of the cylindrical bending of othotropic laminated beamplates subjected to transverse loads and buckling of symmetric laminated cross-ply rectangular plates subjected to uniaxial compression.

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