Chaotic and bifurcation dynamics of a simply-supported thermo-elastic circular plate with variable thickness in large deflection

This paper presents the conditions that can possibly lead to chaotic motion and bifurcation behavior for a simply-supported large deflection thermo-elastic circular plate with variable thickness by utilizing the criteria of fractal dimensions, maximum Lyapunov exponents and bifurcation diagrams. The governing partial differential equation of the simply supported thermo-elastic circular plate with variable thickness is first derived by means of Galerkin method. Several different features including Fourier spectra, phase plot, Poincar’e map and bifurcation diagrams are numerically computed. These features are used to characterize the dynamic behavior of the plate subjected to various excitations of lateral loads and thermal loads. Numerical examples are presented to verify the conditions that lead to chaotic motion and the effectiveness of the proposed modeling approach. Numerical modeling results indicate that large deflection motion of a thermo-elastic circular plate with variable thickness possesses chaotic motions and bifurcation motion under different lateral loads and thermal loads. The simulation results also indicate that the periodic motion of a circular plate can be obtained for the convex or the concave circular plate. The dynamic motion of the circular plate is periodic for the cases including (1) the lateral loading frequency is within a specific range, (2) thermal and lateral loadings are operated in a specific range and (3) the thickness parameter is less than a specific critical value for the convex circular plate or greater than a specific critical value for the concave circular plate. The modeling results show that the proposed method can be employed to predict the non-linear dynamics of any large deflection circular plate with variable thickness.