Free vibration of sandwich plates with laminated faces

Description is given of the development of a spline finite strip method for predicting the natural frequencies and modes of conventional rectangular sandwich plates. The faceplates are treated as being classically thin and may be of composite laminated construction. The core is modelled as a three-dimensional body. Finite strip stiffness and mass properties are based on a displacement field which represents eight fundamental through-thickness displacements as a series of products of longitudinal B-spline functions and crosswise Lagrangian or Hermitian polynominal shape functions. The solution procedure utilizes the efficient superstrip concept in conjunction with the extended Sturm sequence-bisection approach. A variety of applications of the developed analysis capability is described which demonstrates the nature of the convergence of the finite strip predictions of natural frequencies and the close comparison of these predictions with available results in the literature, and also the use of the capability in parametric studies. Copyright (C) 2002 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.