A curved hierarchical finite element method for the nonlinear vibration analysis of functionally graded sandwich elliptic plates

ABSTRACT

This study of bi-FGM sandwich elliptic plates is carried out to investigate the vibration behavior using a curved hierarchical finite element. The plate is made up of two face-sheet layers with two different mixtures of FGM and one layer of homogeneous core. The blending function method is used to describe accurately the geometry of the elliptic plate. The accuracy of the present method is established by the comparisons made with the published results. Contour plots of frequency parameters as functions of the volume fraction exponents and thickness for bi-FGM sandwich plates are carried out.

KEYWORDS:

• Curved hierarchical finite element
• linear and nonlinear vibration
• bi-functionally graded material
• sandwich elliptic plates
• two independent volume fraction exponents