Study on dynamic characteristics of smart composite laminates with partially debonded piezoelectric actuator

Abstract

The dynamic characteristics of smart composite laminates with partially debonded piezoelectric actuator are investigated in this work. The proposed work introduces an improved layerwise theory based mathematical modeling with the Heaviside unit step functions to allow the possible sliding of the in-plane displacements and jump of the out-of-plane displacements for the debonded area. The finite element implementation is conducted using the four-node plate element to derive the governing equation. The dynamic characteristics are investigated by the frequency domain and time domain. The influence of actuator debonding to the natural frequencies is subtler for such kind of smart composite structures. The debonding of piezoelectric actuator also decreases its actuation ability that is reflected in the magnitudes of the system response. The proposed method can well predict the responses of the smart composite laminates with actuator debonding failures and it could be applied to the further damage detection methods.