Dissipation induced instabilities in continuous non-conservative systems

In this contribution we analyze the stabilizing and destabilizing effect of small damping for rather general class of continuous non-conservative systems, described by the non-self-adjoint boundary eigenvalue problems. Explicit asymptotic expressions obtained for the stability domain allow us to predict when a given combination of the damping parameters leads to increase or to decrease in the critical non-conservative load. The results obtained explain why different types of internal and external damping so surprisingly influence on the stability of non-conservative systems. As a mechanical example the stability of a viscoelastic rod with small internal and external damping, loaded by tangential follower force, is studied in detail. (© 2005 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)