Characteristic Constraint Modes for Component Mode Synthesis

Abstract

A technique is presented for reducing the size of a model generated by the Craig-Bampton method (Craig, R. R., and Bampton, M. C. C., Coupling of Substructures for Dynamic Analyses, AIAA Journal, Vol. 6, No. 7, 1968, pp. 1313-1319) of component mode synthesis (CMS). An eigenanalysis is performed on the partitions of the CMS mass and stiffness matrices that correspond to the so-called constraint modes. The resultant eigenvectors are referred to as characteristic constraint modes because they represent the characteristic motion of the interface between the component structures. When the characteristic constraint modes are truncated, a CMS model with a highly reduced number of degrees of freedom may be obtained. An example of a cantilever plate is considered. It is shown that relatively few characteristic constraint modes are needed to yield accurate approximations of the lower natural frequencies. Furthermore, this method yields physical insight into the mechanisms of vibration transmission in complex structures, and it provides an excellent framework for the efficient calculation of power flow.