An assumed-stress hybrid element for modeling of plates with shear deformations on elastic foundation

In this paper a four-node hybrid stress element is proposed for analysing arbitrarily shaped plates on a two parameter elastic foundation. The element is developed by combining a hybrid plate stress element and a soil element. The formulation is based on Hellinger-Reissner variational principle in which both inter element compatible boundary displacement and equilibrated stress fields for the plate as well as the foundation are chosen separately. This formulation also allows a low order polynomial interpolation functions. Numerical examples are presented to show that the validity and efficiency of the present element for the plate analysis resting on an elastic foundation. In these examples the effect of soil depth, interaction between closed plates on soil parameters, comparison with Winkler hypothesis is investigated.