Analysis and active control of nonlinear vibration of composite lattice sandwich plates

This paper is devoted to investigate the nonlinear vibration characteristics and active control of composite lattice sandwich plates using piezoelectric actuator and sensor. Three types of the sandwich plates with pyramidal, tetrahedral and Kagome cores are considered. In the structural modeling, the von Kármán large deflection theory is applied to establish the strain–displacement relations. The nonlinear equations of motion of the structures are derived by Hamilton’s principle with the assumed mode method. The nonlinear free and forced vibration responses of the lattice sandwich plates are calculated. The velocity feedback control (VFC) and H_∞ control methods are applied to design the controller. The nonlinear vibration responses of the sandwich plates with pyramidal, tetrahedral and Kagome cores are compared. The influences of the ply angle of the laminated face sheets, the thicknesses of the lattice core and face sheets and the excitation amplitude on the nonlinear vibration behaviors of the sandwich plates are investigated. The correctness of the H_∞ control algorithm is verified by comparing with the experiment results reported in the literature. The controlled nonlinear vibration response of the sandwich plate is computed and compared with that of the uncontrolled structural system. Numerical results indicate that the VFC and H_∞ control methods can effectively suppress the large amplitude vibration of the composite lattice sandwich plates.

     

Parametric vibration stability and active control of nonlinear beams

The vibration stability and the active control of the parametrically excited nonlinear beam structures are studied by using the piezoelectric material. The velocity feedback control algorithm is used to obtain the active damping. The cubic nonlinear equation of motion with damping is established by employing Hamilton’s principle. The multiple-scale method is used to solve the equation of motion, and the stable region is obtained. The effects of the control gain and the amplitude of the external force on the stable region and the amplitude-frequency curve are analyzed numerically. From the numerical results, it is seen that, with the increase in the feedback control gain, the axial force, to which the structure can be subjected, is increased, and in a certain scope, the structural active damping ratio is also increased. With the increase in the control gain, the response amplitude decreases gradually, but the required control voltage exists a peak value.     

Controllable wave propagation in a weakly nonlinear monoatomic lattice chain with nonlocal interaction and active control

The one-dimensional monoatomic lattice chain connected by nonlinear springs is investigated, and the asymptotic solution is obtained through the Lindstedt-Poincar′e perturbation method. The dispersion relation is derived with the consideration of both the nonlocal and the active control effects. The numerical results show that the nonlocal effect can effectively enhance the frequency in the middle part of the dispersion curve.When the nonlocal effect is strong enough, zero and negative group velocities will be evoked at different points along the dispersion curve, which will provide different ways of transporting energy including the forward-propagation, localization, and backwardpropagation of wavepackets related to the phase velocity. Both the nonlinear effect and the active control can enhance the frequency, but neither of them is able to produce zero or negative group velocities. Specifically, the active control enhances the frequency of the dispersion curve including the point at which the reduced wave number equals zero, and therefore gives birth to a nonzero cutoff frequency and a band gap in the low frequency range. With a combinational adjustment of all these effects, the wave propagation behaviors can be comprehensively controlled, and energy transferring can be readily manipulated in various ways.     

Aeroelastic suppression of an airfoil with control surface using nonlinear energy sink

Aeroelasticity exists in airfoil with control surface freeplay, which may induce instability in an incompressible flow. In this paper, a nonlinear energy sink (NES) is used to suppress the aeroelasticity of an airfoil with a control surface. The freeplay and cubic nonlinearity in pitch are taken into account. The harmonic balance method is used to analytically determine the limit cycle oscillations (LCOs) amplitudes of the airfoil–NES system. Linear and nonlinear flutter speeds are detected from the airfoil with control surface freeplay. When NES is attached, both the linear flutter speed of airfoil without freeplay and the nonlinear flutter speed of airfoil with a freeplay are increased. Moreover, the LCO amplitude of airfoil is decreased due to NES. Then, the influences of NES parameters on the increase in flutter boundary of airfoil are carefully studied.     

Cell size effects for vibration analysis and design of sandwich beams

In this work, sandwich beams are studied to reveal the underlying size effects of the periodic core cells for the first time within the framework of free vibration analysis of such an advanced lightweight structure. The energy equivalence method is formulated as a theoretical approach that takes into account the cell size effect. It is compared with the asymptotic homogenization method and direct finite element method systematically to show their consistence and applicability. The accuracy of free vibration responses predicted by the detailed finite element model is used as the standard of comparison. It is shown that the cell size is an important parameter characterizing the cellular core rigidities that influence vibration responses. The homogenization model agrees exactly with the asymptotic solution of the analytical expression of the beam model only whenever the cell size tends to be infinitely small.     

Size effects of basic cell in static analysis of sandwich beams

In this paper, multilayered sandwich beam structures are considered. Within the scope of static analyses and stiffness design of such type of lightweight and functional structures, size effects of the basic cell are studied both theoretically and numerically in a systematic way for the first time. The direct FE discretization method, the homogenization method and the classical beam theory are examined systematically to reveal, on one hand, the existence of the size effect, and on the other hand, the ability of each method in capturing the size effect upon the static stress distribution and structural deflection. Particularly, limitations of the homogenization method are clarified although the latter is widely applied today in the equivalent modeling and topology design of cellular materials of sandwich structures. By means of the above methods, bending problems of multilayered beams and cellular core sandwiches are solved to illustrate variations of the deflection, stress as well as the computing accuracies in terms of the size of the basic cell. It is shown that the size effect is important when the basic cell has a considerable dimension relative to the structural size and that this effect decreases rapidly with the size reduction of the basic cell. Theoretically, the homogenized result corresponds to the limit solution when the size of the basic cell tends to be infinitely small.     

Dynamic geometrically nonlinear analysis of transversely compressible sandwich plates

In order to construct a plate theory for a thick transversely compressible sandwich plate with composite laminated face sheets, the authors make simplifying assumptions regarding distribution of transverse strain components in the thickness direction. The in-plane stresses and σ_yy (Fig. 1) are computed from the constitutive equations, and the improved values of transverse stress components and σ_zz need to be computed by integration of pointwise equations of motion in a post-process stage of the finite element analysis. The improved values of the transverse strains can also be computed in the post-process stage by substituting the improved transverse stresses into the constitutive relations. A problem of cylindrical bending of a simply supported plate under a uniform load on the upper surface is considered, and comparison is made between the displacements, the in-plane stress and the improved transverse stresses (obtained by integration of the pointwise equations of motion), computed from the plate theory, with the corresponding values of exact elasticity solutions. In this comparison, a good agreement of both solutions is achieved. In the finite element analysis of sandwich plates in cylindrical bending with small thickness-to-length ratios, the shear locking phenomenon does not occur. The model of a sandwich plate in cylindrical bending, presented in this paper, has a wider range of applicability than the models presented in literature so far: it can be applied to the sandwich plates with a wide range of ratios of thickness to the in-plane dimensions, with both thin and thick face sheets (as compared to the thickness of the core) and to the sandwich plates with both transversely rigid and transversely compressible face sheets and cores.     

Vibration analysis and active control of nearly periodic two-span beams with piezoelectric actuator/sensor pairs

The piezoelectric materials are used to investigate the active vibration control of ordered/disordered periodic two-span beams. The equation of motion of each sub-beam with piezoelectric patches is established based on Hamilton's principle with an assumed mode method. The velocity feedback control algorithm is used to design the controller. The free and forced vibration behaviors of the two-span beams with the piezoelectric actuators and sensors are analyzed. The vibration properties of the disordered two-span beams caused by misplacing the middle support are also researched. In addition, the effects of the length disorder degree on the vibration performances of the disordered beams are investigated. From the numerical results, it can be concluded that the disorder in the length of the periodic two-span beams will cause vibration localizations of the free and forced vibrations of the structure, and the vibration localization phenomenon will be more and more obvious when the length difference between the two sub-beams increases. Moreover, when the velocity feedback control is used, both the forced and the free vibrations will be suppressed. Meanwhile, the vibration behaviors of the two-span beam are tuned.     

An efficient coupled layerwise theory for static analysis of piezoelectric sandwich beams

Summary An efficient one-dimensional model is developed for the statics of piezoelectric sandwich beams. Third-order zigzag approximation is used for axial displacement, and the potential is approximated as piecewise linear. The displacement field is expressed in terms of three primary displacement variables and the electric potential variables by satisfying the conditions of zero transverse shear stress at the top and bottom and its continuity at layer interfaces. The deflection field accounts for the piezoelectric transverse normal strain. The governing equations are derived using a variational principle. The present results agree very well with the exact solution for thin and thick highly inhomogeneous simply supported hybrid sandwich beams. The developed theory can accurately model open and closed circuit boundary conditions. The first author is grateful to DST, Government of India, for financial support for this work.     

Strength and stiffness of sandwich beams in bending

This investigation is concerned with the experimental versus analytical correlation of the mechanical properties of sandwich-beam specimens. Such sandwich structures are commonly employed in the aircraft industry. Four-point and three-point load tests were conducted on a large number of sandwich-beam specimens, fabricated by using fiber-glass reinforced plastics (both unidirectional and woven-glass cloth) and DTD 685 aluminum alloy for the facings with aluminum honeycomb core and polyurethane foam cores and the indigenously available Araldite as the bonding medium between the core and the facings.The flexural stiffness of the composite sandwich specimens used in this investigation compared favorably with theoretical predictions. The shear stiffness was found to be about 55 percent and 45 percent of the theoretically predicted values for FRP (fiberglass-reinforced-plastic) cloth and FRP unidirectional laminates with aluminum honeycomb core sandwich, respectively. The failure load as determined by experiments was less than the theoretically predicted safe load. There was a loss of strength as well as a steep decrease in the failure load in the case of low density foam core.It was concluded that FRP facing plates with aluminum honeycomb core sandwich structure may be preferred to similar aluminum-alloy facing sandwich construction if high flexural stiffness and shear stiffness properties are required at less cost and weight. Indigenously available Araldite was quite satisfactory for bonding the core to the facings.This investigation has confirmed the importance of experiments in the field of sandwich structures which can effectively replace other conventional uneconomical structural or machine members which are currently in use.     

Aeroelastic dynamics stability of rotating sandwich annular plate with viscoelastic core layer

A dynamic model for a rotating sandwich annular plate with a viscoelastic core layer is developed. All fundamental equations and boundary conditions are established based on Hamilton’s principle, and the rotation effect and viscoelastic properties of the sandwich structure are taken into account. The aerodynamics force acting on the plate is described by a rotating damping model, and the constitutive behavior of the viscoelastic core layer is formulated by the frequency-dependent complex modulus. The effects of geometrical and material parameters on frequencies and damping of forward and backward traveling waves and the dynamic stability for the rotating sandwich plate are numerically analyzed by means of Galerkin’s method. The results show that the critical and flutter speeds of the rotating plate can be increased at some certain parameters of the viscoelastic core layer.     

Dynamic response of elastic-plastic ideal sandwich beams

The dynamic response of elastic-plastic ideal sandwich beams is investigated. The plastic deformation is interpreted as a kind of general loads in the elastic beams, while the moving interfaces between elastic and plastic regions are treated as external restraint conditions. Particularly, the dynamic response of a cantilever beam is investigated using the classical method by means of the superposition of the vibration modes of elastic beams. The numerical results show that, compared with the rigid plastic solutions, the dynamic behavior of elastoplastic beam exhibits complex response modes. In some cases, elastic deformation has very important effects on the response mode of the beam, so it should not be ignored.     

Aeroelastic analysis of swept pre-twisted wings

In this paper, aeroelastic modeling of aircraft wings with variations in sweep angle, taper ratio, and variable pre-twist angle along the span is considered. The wing structure is modeled as a classical beam with torsion and bending flexibility. The governing equations are derived based on Hamilton’s principle. Moreover, Peters’ finite state aerodynamic model which is modified to take into account the effects of the wing finite-span, the wing sweep angle, and the wing pre-twist angle, is used to simulate the aerodynamic loads on the wing. The coupled partially differential equations are discretized to a set of ordinary differential equations using Galerkin’s approach. By solving these equations the aeroelastic instability conditions are derived. The results are compared with some experimental and analytical results of previous published papers and good agreement is attained. Effects of the wing sweep angle, taper ratio, bending to torsional rigidity, and pre-twist angle on the flutter boundary in several cases are studied. Results show that these geometrical and physical parameters have considerable effects on the wing flutter boundary.     

The composite damping capacity of sandwich cantilever beams

The governing equation of the flexural forced vibration of a cantilever sandwich beam excited by a sinusoidal displacement at the clamped end is developed by utilizing the conventional Hamilton's Principle. The effect of damping of the composite beam is incorporated into the elastic equation of motion by utilizing the Correspondence Principle of the linear viscoelastic theory. Several plots for different values of the composite damping factor are presented. For comparison, an experimental setup was utilized to test different composite beams. The variation of the experimental results with those derived theoretically seem to be in agreement within the frequency range of the first few modes.     

Analysis of building structures by replacement sandwich beams

In this paper replacement beams of building structures are developed, and the stiffnesses of the replacement beams are derived. The analysis is robust and can be used for slender and wide structures consisting of frames, trusses, shear walls, or coupled shear walls. The utility of the derived replacement beam is demonstrated through the examples of the in plane and flexural–torsional buckling and vibration analyses of high-rise buildings.     

Design of active flutter suppression and wind-tunnel tests of a wing model involving a control delay

In this study, a delayed controller was designed for active flutter suppression of a three-dimensional wing model. The design of controller can be divided into two steps. At the first step, a short time delay was artificially introduced into the control loop and the dynamic equations of the aeroelastic system with delayed control were converted into a set of delay-free state-space equations by using a state transformation. At the second step, the control law was synthesized by using the theory of optimal control for the delay-free state-space equations. To demonstrate the performance of the delayed controller, the margin of time delay was studied. The numerical results showed that the delayed controller had good robustness with respect to the time delay. Moreover, the delayed controller was digitally implemented and tested for the three-dimensional wing model in NH-2 subsonic wind-tunnel. The experimental results illustrated that the critical flow speed of flutter instability of the wing model could be effectively increased from 36.5 m/s to 39 m/s.     

Modeling of wireless remote shape control for beams using nonlinear photostrictive actuators

Photostrictive materials produce mechanical strain when irradiated by ultraviolet light, thus may be used in wireless remote control of smart microstructures. This paper presents an investigation into modelling and static shape control of beams with nonlinear photostrictive actuators. Governing equations of beams bonded with photostrictive actuator patches are derived to study the interaction between the photostrictive actuators and the host beams. An analytical solution method is presented to solve the governing equations of the beams with discretely distributed photostrictive actuators. An iterative procedure is developed to find optimal light intensities in photostrictive actuators that best match the actuated shape to the desired one. An example is given to illustrate the model and shape control of a beam with PLZT actuators.     

The active control of vibrations of composite beams by parametric stiffness modulation

The paper addresses an active control of the resonant vibrations of composite beams performed by a parametric stiffness modulation. A sandwich beam composition with the continuous core is considered. The stiffness modulation is introduced by some fairly small changes in an orientation of elements of the microstructure of a core ply. The controlled vibrations are those of the dominantly flexural type excited by a transverse force acting at a low resonant frequency, whereas the stiffness modulation is performed at a comparatively high frequency identified by the resonance of a mode of the dominantly shear type. This difference in time scales of the controlled vibrations and the input signal facilitates a use of the method of direct partition of motion that predicts an existence of the modal interaction between the low-frequency and the high-frequency motions due to so-called vibrational forces. It is shown that such a parametric control can provide a significant favourable shift of the first eigenfrequency of a controlled beam (the one subjected to the stiffness modulation) from its nominal value for an uncontrolled beam. Heavy fluid loading conditions are accounted for as well as material losses in a structure. Then instead of analysis of eigenfrequencies, a problem of forced vibrations is posed and the forced frequency–amplitude response is analysed. It is demonstrated that although heavy fluid loading reduces resonant frequencies of forced vibrations, the suggested mechanism of control remains valid in these cases.