Active damping of geometrically nonlinear vibrations of laminated composite shallow shells using vertically/obliquely reinforced 1-3 piezoelectric composites

This paper addresses the analysis of active constrained layer damping (ACLD) of geometrically nonlinear transient vibrations of laminated thin composite cylindrical shallow shells using vertically reinforced 1-3 piezoelectric composite (PZC). The constraining layer of the ACLD treatment is considered to be made of this 1-3 PZC material. The Golla–Hughes–McTavish (GHM) method has been implemented to model the constrained viscoelastic layer of the ACLD treatment in time domain. The Von Karman type non-linear strain displacement relations and the first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT) are used for deriving this electromechanical coupled problem. A three dimensional finite element (FE) model of smart composite shallow shells integrated with a patch of such ACLD treatment has been developed to demonstrate the performance of the patch on enhancing the damping characteristics of thin laminated cylindrical shells, in controlling the geometrically nonlinear transient vibrations. The numerical results indicate that the ACLD patch significantly improves the damping characteristics of the shells for suppressing the geometrically nonlinear transient vibrations of the shells. The effect of variation of fiber orientation in the PZC material on the control authority of the ACLD patch has also been investigated.