Symplectic analytical solutions for free vibration of elastically line-hinged orthotropic rectangular plates with rotationally restrained edges

The elastically line-hinged orthotropic rectangular plates with rotationally restrained edges are commonly used in engineering applications such as deployable structures. However, it is intractable to obtain the analytical solutions for the free vibration problems of such structures owing to the challenges in processing the high-order partial differential equations. Here, we make a first attempt to deal with such issues within the Hamilton system-based symplectic space. The problem of a plate is transformed into the symplectic space from the Euclidean space, and the subplates that may be analyzed analytically by the symplectic superposition method are then obtained with the division of the entire plate. The complex boundary and connection forms are achieved by enforcing mechanical quantities with undetermined expansion coefficients on the edges of the subplates. By integrating the solutions of the subplates, the final solution of an elastically line-hinged orthotropic rectangular plate with rotationally restrained edges is accessible. The proposed solution scheme is performed with rational derivations, with no requirement for pre-defined solution forms. Comprehensive results with validations under various boundary and hinge connection cases are presented. Moreover, detailed parametric investigations are conducted, which could facilitate the engineering design of deployable structures.