Four-beam model for vibration analysis of a cantilever beam with an embedded horizontal crack

As one of the main failure modes, embedded cracks occur in beam structures due to periodic loads. Hence it is useful to investigate the dynamic characteristics of a beam structure with an embedded crack for early crack detection and diagnosis. A new four-beam model with local flexibilities at crack tips is developed to investigate the transverse vibration of a cantilever beam with an embedded horizontal crack; two separate beam segments are used to model the crack region to allow opening of crack surfaces. Each beam segment is considered as an Euler-Bernoulli beam. The governing equations and the matching and boundary conditions of the four-beam model are derived using Hamilton’s principle. The natural frequencies and mode shapes of the four-beam model are calculated using the transfer matrix method. The effects of the crack length, depth, and location on the first three natural frequencies and mode shapes of the cracked cantilever beam are investigated. A continuous wavelet transform method is used to analyze the mode shapes of the cracked cantilever beam. It is shown that sudden changes in spatial variations of the wavelet coefficients of the mode shapes can be used to identify the length and location of an embedded horizontal crack. The first three natural frequencies and mode shapes of a cantilever beam with an embedded crack from the finite element method and an experimental investigation are used to validate the proposed model. Local deformations in the vicinity of the crack tips can be described by the proposed four-beam model, which cannot be captured by previous methods.