Guided waves energy velocity in absorbing and non-absorbing plates

This paper presents a study of the velocity of the propagation of energy in guided waves in plates. The motivation of the work comes from the practical observation that the conventional approach to predicting the velocities of pulses or wave packets, that is, the simple group velocity calculation, breaks down when the guided waves are attenuative. The conventional approach is therefore not valid for guided waves in absorbing materials or for leaky waves. The paper presents a theoretical derivation of an expression to predict the energy velocity of guided waves in an isotropic plate, based on the integration of the Poynting energy vectors. When applied to modes with no attenuation, it is shown analytically from this expression that the energy velocity is always identical to the group velocity. On the other hand, when applied to attenuative modes, numerical integration of the expression to yield the true energy velocity shows that this can differ quite significantly from the group velocity. Experimental validation of the expression is achieved by measuring the velocity of wave packets in an absorbing plate, under such conditions when the energy velocity differs substantially from the group velocity. Excellent agreement is found between the predictions and the measurements. The paper also shows the Poynting vectors in the various model studies, and some interesting phenomena relating to their directions. (C) 2001 Acoustical Society of America.