Comparison of Vibration Characteristics for Postbuckled Fgm Plates With Piezoelectric Fiber Reinforced Composite Actuators

Vibration analysis is carried out for compressively loaded and thermally loaded postbuckled functionally graded material (FGM) plates with piezoelectric fiber reinforced composite (PFRC) actuators. The temperature field is assumed to be uniformly distributed over the plate surface but it varies through the thickness. The electric field has a non-zero-valued component E_Z. Material properties of the substrate FGM layer are assumed to be graded in the thickness direction according to a simple power law distribution in terms of the volume fractions of the constituents. The material properties of both FGM and PFRC layers are assumed to be temperature-dependent. The formulations are based on a third order shear deformation plate theory and the general von Kármán-type equation that include thermo-piezoelectric effects. The numerical illustrations cover small- and large- amplitude vibration characteristics of postbuckled, mid-plane symmetric FGM plates with surface-bonded or embedded PFRC actuators under uniform and non-uniform temperature fields. The results for monolithic piezoelectric actuators, which is a special case in the present study, are compared with those of PFRC actuators. The results reveal that control voltage has a small effect on the vibration characteristics of the compressed postbuckled FGM plate with PFRC actuators but has a relatively large effect on the natural frequency of thermally postbuckled plates.