An advanced five-unknown higher-order theory for free vibration of composite and sandwich plates

Accurate prediction of dynamic characteristics is quite critical to understand the strength of layered structures. Nevertheless, the existing five-unknown higher-order theories encounter difficulties to forecast accurately the dynamic response of sandwich structures. Therefore, a new five-unknown higher-order theory is developed for free vibration analysis of composite and sandwich plates, which possesses the same degree of freedom as those of other five-unknown higher order theories. The developed model can meet beforehand interlaminar continuity conditions and the free-surface conditions of transverse shear stresses. To assess capability of the proposed model, analytical solution for such composite structures with simply-supported conditions has been presented by employing Hamilton's principle, which is utilized for analysis of mechanical behaviors of composite and sandwich plates. Compared with the three-dimensional (3D) elasticity solutions, 3D finite element results and the results obtained from the chosen five-unknown higher-order models, the proposed model can yield accurately natural frequencies of composite and sandwich plates. Even for the thick plates, the higher-order frequencies calculated from the proposed model are in good agreement with the 3D finite element results. By studying effect of the thickness/length ratios on natural frequencies, it is found that the proposed model is adaptable to predicting natural frequencies of the sandwich plates with the thickness/length ratios between 1/4 and 1/100. In addition, some factors influencing accuracy of five-unknown higher-order models have been investigated in detail. Finally, by means of numerical analysis and discussion, some conclusions have been drawn as well, which can serve as a reference for other investigators. (c) 2021 Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Automated summary

The study introduces a new five-unknown higher-order theory for free vibration analysis of composite and sandwich plates. The proposed model accurately predicts the natural frequencies of composite and sandwich plates, performing well even for thick plates. Some factors influencing the accuracy of five-unknown higher-order models have been investigated in detail, providing valuable insights for future research.