An efficient differential quadrature methodology for free vibration analysis of arbitrary straight-sided quadrilateral thin plates

In this paper, a new differential quadrature (DQ) methodology is employed to study free vibration of irregular quadrilateral straight-sided thin plates. A four-nodded super element is used to map the irregular physical domain into a square domain in the computational domain. Second order transformation schemes with relative ease and less computation are employed to transform the fourth order governing equation of thin plates between the two domains. The only degree of freedom within the domain is the displacement, whereas along the boundaries, the displacement as well as the second order derivative of the displacement with respect to associated normal co-ordinate variable in computational domain are the two degrees of freedom. Implementing the method, the formulation for the DQ method for the free vibration analysis of plates of straight-sided shapes was presented together with the implementation procedure for the different boundary conditions. To demonstrate the accuracy, convergency and stability of the new methodology, detail studies are made on isotropic plates at acute angles with different geometries, boundary and loading conditions including DQ free-edge boundary condition implementations. Accurate results even with fewer degrees of freedom than for those of comparable numerical algorithms were achieved.     

A semi-analytic solution for free vibration of annular sector plates

The paper describes a semi-analytical method in which the basic function in the circumferential direction satisfying the boundary conditions of the radial edges is substituted into the free vibration equation of the curved plate. By a suitable transformation, an ordinary differential equation is obtained. The resulting equation is solved by a finite difference technique. Tabulated results have been presented for annular sector plates possessing different boundary conditions. Excellent accuracy has been obtained wherever comparisons have been possible.     

Three-dimensional free vibration of thick functionally graded annular plates in thermal environment

The free vibration analysis of functionally graded (FG) thick annular plates subjected to thermal environment is studied based on the 3D elasticity theory. The material properties are assumed to be temperature dependent and graded in the thickness direction. Considering the thermal environment effects and using Hamilton's principle, the equations of motion are derived. The effects of the initial thermal stresses are considered accurately by obtaining them from the 3D thermoelastic equilibrium equations. The differential quadrature method (DQM) as an efficient and accurate numerical tool is used to solve both the thermoelastic equilibrium and free vibration equations. Very fast rate of convergence of the method is demonstrated. Also, the formulation is validated by comparing the results with those obtained based on the first-order shear deformation theory and also with those available in the literature for the limit cases, i.e. annular plates without thermal effects. The effects of temperature rise, material and geometrical parameters on the natural frequencies are investigated. The new results can be used as benchmark solutions for future researches.     

Closed-form solution for free vibration of piezoelectric coupled annular plates using Levinson plate theory

Free vibration analysis of annular moderately thick plates integrated with piezoelectric layers is investigated in this study for different combinations of soft simply supported, hard simply supported and clamped boundary conditions at the inner and outer edges of the annular plate on the basis of the Levinson plate theory (LPT). The distribution of electric potential along the thickness direction in the piezoelectric layer is assumed as a sinusoidal function so that the Maxwell static electricity equation is approximately satisfied. The differential equations of motion are solved analytically for various boundary conditions of the plate. In this study the closed-form solution for characteristic equations, displacement components of the plate and electric potential are derived for the first time in the literature. To demonstrate the accuracy of the present solution, comparison studies is first carried out with the available data in the literature and then natural frequencies of the piezoelectric coupled annular plate are presented for different thickness-radius ratios, inner-outer radius ratios, thickness of piezoelectric, material of piezoelectric and boundary conditions. Present analytical model provides design reference for piezoelectric material application, such as sensors, actuators and ultrasonic motors.     

Natural vibration of circular and annular thin plates by Hamiltonian approach

The present paper deals with the natural vibration of thin circular and annular plates using Hamiltonian approach. It is based on the conservation principle of mixed energy and is constructed in a new symplectic space. A set of Hamiltonian dual equations with derivatives with respect to the radial coordinate on one side of the equations and to the angular coordinate on the other side are obtained by using the variational principle of mixed energy. The separation of variables is employed to solve Hamiltonian dual equations of eigenvalue problem. Analytical frequency equations are obtained based on different cases of boundary conditions. The natural frequencies are the roots of the frequency equations and corresponding mode functions are in terms of the dual variables q₁(r, θ). Three basic edge-constraint cases for circular plates and nine edge-constraint cases for annular plates are calculated and the results are compared well with existing ones.     

Free vibration of annular sector plates by an integral equation technique

A numerical method is presented for the free vibration analysis of polar orthotropic clamped annular sector plates. The results are compared with analytical and experimental values of other investigators. A parametric study has been done by varying the sector angle and radii ratio. The frequencies for isotropic and orthotropic cases are presented in the form of graphs.     

An extended transfer matrix-finite element method for free vibration of plates

A combination of extended transfer matrix and finite element methods is proposed for obtaining vibration frequencies of structures. This method yields the value of the frequency once a trial value is assumed. By using this technique, the number of nodes required in the regular finite element method is reduced and therefore a smaller computer can be used. Besides, no plotting of the values of the determinants corresponding to each assumed frequency is necessary. A worked example is given for the case of vibration of a cantilever plate. The results show fast convergence from the assumed value to the true natural frequency.     

Three-dimensional free vibration analysis of isotropic rectangular plates using the B-spline Ritz method

This paper presents three-dimensional free vibration analysis of isotropic rectangular plates with any thicknesses and arbitrary boundary conditions using the B-spline Ritz method based on the theory of elasticity. The proposed method is formulated by the Ritz procedure with a triplicate series of B-spline functions as amplitude displacement components. The geometric boundary conditions are numerically satisfied by the method of artificial spring. To demonstrate the convergence and accuracy of the present method, several examples with various boundary conditions are solved, and the results are compared with other published solutions by exact and other numerical methods based on the theory of elasticity and various plate theories. Rapid, stable convergences as well as high accuracy are obtained by the present method. The effects of geometric parameters on the vibrational behavior of cantilevered rectangular plates are also investigated. The results reported here may serve as benchmark data for finite element solutions and future developments in numerical methods.     

Buckling and free vibration analyses of stiffened plates using the FSDT mesh-free method

This paper presents a mesh-free Galerkin method for the free vibration and stability analyses of stiffened plates via the first-order shear deformable theory (FSDT). The model of a stiffened plate is formed by (1) regarding the plate and the stiffener separately, (2) imposing displacement compatible conditions between the plate and the stiffener so that displacement fields of the stiffener can be expressed in terms of the mid-surface displacement of the plate, and (3) superimposing the strain energy of plate and stiffener. Because there are no meshes used in this method, the stiffeners can be placed anywhere on the plate and need not be placed along the mesh lines. Several numerical examples are computed by this method to show its accuracy and convergence. The present results demonstrate good agreement with the existing solutions given by other researchers and the ANSYS. Influences of support size and order of the complete basis functions on the numerical accuracy are also investigated.     

2-D differential quadrature solution for vibration analysis of functionally graded conical, cylindrical shell and annular plate structures

This paper focuses on the dynamic behavior of functionally graded conical, cylindrical shells and annular plates. The last two structures are obtained as special cases of the conical shell formulation. The first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT) is used to analyze the above moderately thick structural elements. The treatment is developed within the theory of linear elasticity, when materials are assumed to be isotropic and inhomogeneous through the thickness direction. The two-constituent functionally graded shell consists of ceramic and metal that are graded through the thickness, from one surface of the shell to the other. Two different power-law distributions are considered for the ceramic volume fraction. The homogeneous isotropic material is inferred as a special case of functionally graded materials (FGM). The governing equations of motion, expressed as functions of five kinematic parameters, are discretized by means of the generalized differential quadrature (GDQ) method. The discretization of the system leads to a standard linear eigenvalue problem, where two independent variables are involved without using the Fourier modal expansion methodology. For the homogeneous isotropic special case, numerical solutions are compared with the ones obtained using commercial programs such as Abaqus, Ansys, Nastran, Straus, Pro/Mechanica. Very good agreement is observed. Furthermore, the convergence rate of natural frequencies is shown to be very fast and the stability of the numerical methodology is very good. Different typologies of non-uniform grid point distributions are considered. Finally, for the functionally graded material case numerical results illustrate the influence of the power-law exponent and of the power-law distribution choice on the mechanical behavior of shell structures.     

Free vibration of continuous polar orthotropic annular and circular plates

The free vibration of a polar orthotropic annular plate supported on concentric circles is analyzed by the Ritz method with use of Lagrange multipliers. A trial function for the deflection of the plate is expressed in terms of simple power series, and a frequency equation for the plate is derived by the condition for minimizing the total potential energy with the constraint equations included. In the numerical examples it is also shown that the method can directly yield quite accurate frequency values for a solid circular plate. Natural frequencies of annular and circular plates are calculated for wide ranges of the support location and orthotropic parameters.     

A comprehensive approach to the free vibration analysis of rectangular plates by use of the method of superposition

The authors have found the above techniques to constitute a powerful means for solving rectangular plate problems. At the time of writing, solutions for plates with two adjacent simply supported edges and two adjacent free edges have been obtained. The first 20 eigen-values for plates with all edges clamped have also been determined for a full range of aspect ratio and they are shown to be accurate to within less than one half of one percent. It will be appreciated that solutions for any combination of clamped-simply supported edge conditions can easily be obtained from the all-clamped solution by simply deleting appropriate solutions from the all-clamped combination. In Figure 2 contour lines for first mode vibration of a plate with two adjacent clamped and two adjacent simply supported edges is presented. The higher density of the contour lines along the simply supported edges will be noted.The method of superposition is currently being used by the authors to good advantage to obtain solutions of any desired degree of accuracy to all of the problems discussed. It is found to be easily utilized and unlike more complicated methods is readily comprehensible to the practicing engineer. Eigenvalues for all modes, aspect ratios, and boundary conditions are readily obtained. Modal shapes are expressed in terms of familiar analytic functions. Results of these studies will be made available in future publications.     

The R-function method for the free vibration analysis of thin orthotropic plates of arbitrary shape

Free flexural vibrations of homogeneous, thin, orthotropic plates of an arbitrary shape with mixed boundary conditions are studied using the R-function method. The proposed method is based on the use of the R-function theory and variational methods. In contrast to the widely used methods of the network type (finite differences, finite element, and boundary element methods), in the R-function method all the geometric information given in the boundary value problem statement is represented in an analytical form. This allows one to seek a solution in a form of some formulas called a solution structure. These solution structures contain some indefinite functional components that can be determined by using any variational method. A method of constructing the solution structures satisfying the required mixed boundary conditions for eigenvalue plate bending problems is described. Numerical examples for the vibration analysis of orthotropic plates of complex geometry with mixed boundary conditions for illustrating the aforementioned R-function method and comparison against the other methods are made to demonstrate its merits.     

Nonlinear free vibration behavior of functionally graded plates

In this paper, an analytical solution is provided for the nonlinear free vibration behavior of plates made of functionally graded materials. The material properties of the functionally graded plates are assumed to vary continuously through the thickness, according to a power-law distribution of the volume fraction of the constituents. The fundamental equations for thin rectangular plates of functionally graded materials are obtained using the von Karman theory for large transverse deflection, and the solution is obtained in terms of mixed Fourier series. The effect of material properties, boundary conditions and thermal loading on the dynamic behavior of the plates is determined and discussed. The results reveal that nonlinear coupling effects play a major role in dictating the fundamental frequency of functionally graded plates.     

Simulating non-linear coupled oscillators by an iterative differential quadrature method

An iterative method based on differential quadrature rules is proposed as a new unified frame of resolution for non-linear two-degree-of-freedom systems. Dynamical systems with Duffing-type non-linearity have been considered. Differential quadrature rules have been applied with a careful distribution of sampling points to reduce the governing equation of motion to two second-order non-linear, non-autonomous ordinary differential equations and to solve the time-domain problem. The time domain of the problem is discretized by means of time intervals, with the same distribution of sampling points used to discretize the space domain (which can be seen as a single interval). It will be shown that accurate solutions depend not only on the choice of the distribution of sampling points, but also on the length of the time interval one refers to in the computations. The numerical results, utilized to draw Poincaré maps, are successfully compared with those obtained using the Runge-Kutta method.