Hydrodynamic analogy for direct shear force and bending moment evaluation in a plate

A brand new interpretation of the plate bending equations is given using hydrodynamic analogy. It permits one to determine directly the shear forces and bending moments of a plate without the need of finding deflections. In engineering design of a plate it is more important to know shear forces and bending moments than the deflections. The existing numerical methods of solution of plate problems consist in determining deflections; then shear forces and bending moments are obtained by differentiating the deflection three and two times which produces great loss of accuracy. The hydrodynamic analogy method has the advantage over other numerical methods because the shear forces and bending moments are obtained directly, without the need of finding deflections and because they are obtained with better accuracy. The hydrodynamic analogy can be applied to a plate of arbitrary shape, with arbitrary boundary conditions under an arbitrary loading.