Edge vibration of a pre-stressed semi-infinite strip with traction-free edge and mixed face boundary conditions

Abstract

Edge-vibration, and associated resonance phenomena, is investigated in respect of a semi-infinite strip composed of pre-stressed incompressible elastic material. The strip is assumed to have a traction free outer edge, with the upper and lower edges subject to some simple mixed boundary conditions. The frequency of the modes of free edge-vibration are shown to depend on the surface wave speed. Moreover, when the normal pre-stress approaches one of two critical values, associated with the vanishing of the surface wave speed, the edge spectrum density of the boundary value problem increases significantly. This problem then provides an example for which the famous Weyl’s hypothesis, stating the edge spectrum is secondary in comparison with the whole body’s spectrum, is not true. However, the corresponding theorem’s statement is valid only with imposition of the Shapiro-Lopatinsky condition, which is not satisfied in this case. Variation of the pre-stress is also shown to greatly influence the resonance frequency arising in the forced vibration problem, to the extent that the phenomenon of resonance may be totally removed.