The first fundamental problem of the theory of elasticity for a rectangular parallelepiped

Abstract

In 1852 Lame [1] formulated the first fundamental problem of the theory of elasticity for a rectangular parallelepiped. An approximate solution to this problem was given by Filonenko-Borodich [2 and 3] who used Castigliano's variational principle. Later Mishonov [4] obtained an approximate solution to Lamé's problem in the form of divergent triple Fourier series. These series contain constants which are found from infinite systems of linear equations. Teodorescu [5] has considered a particular case of Lame's problem. Using his own method the author solves the problem in the form of double series analogous to those used in [6 to 8] and by Baida in [9 and 10] in solving problems on the equilibrium of a rectangular parallelepiped. The solution of the problem reduces to three infinite system of linear equations and the author asserts that these infinite systems are regular. It is shown in Section 5 that the infinite systems obtained by Teodorescu, on the other hand, will not be regular. In the references mentioned above which investigate Lamé's problem the authors confine their attention either to obtaining a solution by an approximate method, or to reducing the solution process to one of obtaining infinite systems, leaving these uninvestigated. It must be emphasized that the main difficulty in solving this problem lies in investigating the infinite systems obtained which are significantly different from the infinite systems of the corresponding plane problem. In this paper a solution is given to the first fundamental problem of the theory of elasticity for a rectangular parallelepiped with prescribed external stresses on the surface (Sections 2, 3 and 4). For the solution of this problem the author has used a form of the general solution of the homogeneous Lamé equations which contains five arbitrary harmonic functions and which constitutes a generalization of the familiar Papkovich-Neuber solution (Section 1). The solution is expressed in the form of double series containing four series of unknown constants which can be found from four infinite systems of linear algebraic equations. The infinite systems of linear equations obtained is studied for values of Poisson's ratio within the range 0 < σ ≤ 0.18. It is shown that for these values of Poisson's ratio the infinite systems are quasi-fully regular.