Finite Element Analysis on Modal Parameters of Anisotropic Laminated Plates

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the finite element technique for predicting the dynamic properties of anisotropic fiber-reinforced composite laminated plates. Considering the effect of transverse shear deformation, a higher order shear deformation theory which satisifes the zero shear stress conditions at the upper and bottom surfaces is assumed. The natural frequencies and mode shapes of a rectangular plate with all free edges are obtained by finite element method and the modal damping values by finite damped element technique. An equivalent stiffness method is introduced to reduce computation time. Four different theoretical predictions of natural frequencies and damped values of a laminated plate are compared with experimental results. Discussions on the effect of transverse shear deformation to the dynamic properties of composite plates are given.