Limiting Performance Characteristics of Steady-State Systems

Abstract

The problem of determining the limiting (or absolute optimum) performance of mechanical systems subject to steady-state loadings is considered. By replacing portions of a system by generic forces which can represent any configuration, the limiting performance characteristics of the system can be found using mathematical programming techniques. For the class of problems treated here, both performance index and constraints are composed of system response variables, such as displacements, velocities, and accelerations. Details of an efficient linear programming formulation of the problem are presented. In spite of the linear programming solution, no linearity restrictions are placed on the generic forces. Several examples are included.