Stochastic nonlinear free vibration of laminated composite plates resting on elastic foundation in thermal environments

This paper presents the nonlinear free vibration analysis of laminated composite plates resting on elastic foundation with random system properties in thermal environments. System parameters are modeled as basic random variables for accurate prediction of system behavior. A C (0) nonlinear finite element based on HSDT in von Karman sense is used to descretize the laminate. A direct iterative method in conjunction with first-order perturbation technique is outlined and applied to solve the stochastic nonlinear generalized eigenvalue problem. The developed stochastic procedure is successfully used for thermally induced nonlinear free vibration problem with a reasonable accuracy. Numerical results for various combinations of boundary conditions, geometric parameters, amplitude ratios, foundation parameters and thermal loading have been compared with those available in literature and an independent MCS. Some new results are also presented which clearly demonstrate the importance of the randomness in the system parameters on the response of the structures.