Plate bending analysis using the classical or the Reissner–Mindlin models

Abstract

Plates can be solved with the classical or the Reissner–Mindlin plate model using the same computer code with an appropriate treatment of the direct boundary element formulation. A field decomposition is employed to establish a connection between these plate models and to obtain a boundary element formulation for the classical model from that used for the Reissner–Mindlin one. The classical model is related to the irrotational component of the field related to the rotations of the plate. The use of this field component in both the fundamental solution and the direct boundary integral equation of the Reissner–Mindlin model carries the classical model approach. Furthermore, the well-known fundamental solution derived from the classical model can be employed as the irrotational field of the fundamental solution of the Reissner–Mindlin model. In this way, the fundamental solution used by Danson to perform classical analysis was used as the irrotational component and the obtained results were compared with those obtained with the well-known Weeën's formulation.