Analysis of the free vibration of rectangular plates with central cut-outs using the discrete Ritz method. (Q1430847)

The vibration characteristics of thin rectangular plates with central cut-outs have been investigated by using the domain decomposition method. The entire plate configuration has been divided into appropriate sub-domains. Orthogonal polynomials are then used as admissible functions in the Rayleigh-Ritz method to obtain natural frequencies. Two different sets of boundary conditions are considered, namely, (i) all four edges are simply-supported, and (ii) two opposite edges are simply supported, and the other two edges are clamped. The effect of the cut-out size has also been considered in the case when all four edges are simply supported. Some experimental results have been presented. Comparisons of numerical results with those obtained by other investigators show a good agreement