Identification of material properties of a laminated plate from measurements of natural frequencies and modal rotations

Abstract This paper presents a method for identification of material constants of a laminated composite plate. An optimization problem, with an objective function relating experimental and numerical natural frequencies, is formulated and solved. Three optimization algorithms were applied in this study for comparison purposes: (1) particle swarm, (2) genetic, and (3) pattern search algorithms. The identified material constants were validated by comparing modal rotations measured with shearography with those computed by finite element analysis.