Vibration analysis of nonhomogeneous moderately thick plates with point supports resting on Pasternak elastic foundation using element free Galerkin method

In this paper shear deformable plate theory in combination with Element-Free Galerkin Method (EFGM) is used for free vibration analysis of nonhomogeneous moderately thick plates with point supports resting on a two-parameter elastic foundation. It is shown that the vibration results obtained by this method are in a very good agreement with the available literatures in spite of using low numbers of nodes which can be considered as an inconvenience in some other methods to reach a satisfactory accuracy. Also, applicability of the method is demonstrated by solving numerical examples for different values of homogeneity variation parameter, aspect ratio, thickness to length ratio, foundation parameters, various types of boundary conditions and different numbers of point support. The numerical results present valuable information for engineers and designers in various structural applications and also prove useful to use as benchmarks for further references. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.