Flutter of a Wide Strip Plate in a Supersonic Gas Flow

The stability of an elastic plate in the form of a wide strip in a supersonic inviscid gas flow is investigated in the linear approximation. An expression for the dependence of the pressure on the plate deflection, asymptotically exact for wide plates, is used. Two qualitatively different instability types are obtained: flutter with respect to a single oscillatory mode due to negative aerodynamic damping and flutter of a related type due to the interaction of oscillatory modes. For each type the stability criterion and the frequency at which the oscillation amplitude grows most intensely are found.