Nonlinear vibrations of a thin isotropic circular plate subjected to moving point loads

Abstract

Here, we have studied the linear and nonlinear vibrations of a thin circular plate subjected to circularly, radially, and spirally moving transverse point loads. We follow Kirchoff’s theory and then incorporate von Kármán nonlinearity and employ Hamilton’s principle to obtain the governing equations and the associated boundary conditions. We solve the governing equations for the simply-supported and clamped boundary conditions using the mode summation method. Using the harmonic balance method for frequency response and Runge-Kutta method for time response, we solve the resulting coupled and cubic nonlinear ordinary differential equations. We show that the resonance instability due to a circularly moving load can be avoided by splitting it into multiple loads rotating at the same radius and angular speed. With the increasing magnitude of the rotating load, the frequency response of the transverse displacement shows jumps and modal interaction. The transverse response collected at the centre of the plate shows subharmonics of the axisymmetric frequencies only. The spectrum of the linear response due to spirally moving load contains axisymmetric frequencies, the angular speed of the load, their combination, and superharmonics of axisymmetric frequencies.