Large-amplitude vibration of imperfect angle-ply laminated rectangular plate with viscous damping

This paper solves the modified-Duffing ordinary differential equation for large-amplitude vibration of imperfect angle-ply rectangular composite plate. Viscous damping is then introduced in the derivation and analyzed under four different boundary conditions (combining two out-of-plane boundary conditions with two in-plane boundary conditions). It has been shown that even a small viscous damping factor, for example 0.1 from an ordinary damped system can largely decrease the vibration amplitude within several periods. Yet at the same time, the vibration frequency only changes slightly. Furthermore, viscous damping is proved to significantly affect the vibration frequency and the vibration mode from nonlinear to much more linear. This effect is irrelevant to boundary conditions and geometric imperfections.