An integral equation approach to finite deflection of elastic plates

The present paper concerns an approximate integral equation approach to finite deflection of elastic plates with aribitrary plan form. With the combined help of the Berger equation governing non-linear bending and a weighted residual technique for boundary-value problem, a boundary integral equation is formulated for immovable edge conditions. We here clarify the formulation and show that the calculation can be performed, with a slight modification, through a procedure similar to that conventionally employed in the linear bending analysis. Availability of the derived integral equation and the solution scheme is shown by way of simple numerical examples.