Free vibration analysis of cracked thin plates using generalized differential quadrature element method

The aim of the present study is to develop an elemental approach based on the differential quadrature method for free vibration analysis of cracked thin plate structures. For this purpose, the equations of motion are established using the classical plate theory. The well-known Generalized Differential Quadrature Method (GDQM) is utilized to discretize the governing equations on each computational subdomain or element. In this method, the differential terms of a quantity field at a specific computational point should be expressed in a series form of the related quantity at all other sampling points along the domain. However, the existence of any geometric discontinuity, such as a crack, in a computational domain causes some problems in the calculation of differential terms. In order to resolve this problem, the multi-block or elemental strategy is implemented to divide such geometry into several subdomains. By constructing the appropriate continuity conditions at each interface between adjacent elements and a crack tip, the whole discretized governing equations of the structure can be established. Therefore, the free vibration analysis of a cracked thin plate will be provided via the achieved eigenvalue problem. The obtained results show a good agreement in comparison with those found by finite element method.