Aeroelastic analysis of symmetric and non-symmetric trapezoidal honeycomb sandwich plates with FG porous face sheets

Abstract In this paper, the aeroelastic analysis of both symmetric and non-symmetric trapezoidal sandwich plates with various boundary conditions in supersonic airflow is studied. The trapezoidal sandwich plate is composed of an orthotropic honeycomb core and two functionally graded (FG) porous face sheets. The fluid structure interaction equations of the sandwich plates under supersonic airflow are derived based on the first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT) and first-order piston theory. Using the Hamilton's principle, the governing equations of motion and the associated boundary conditions are derived in the Cartesian coordinates. Then, applying a transformation of coordinates, the partial differential equations of motion and the associated boundary conditions are converted from Cartesian coordinates into new computational coordinates. The transferred partial differential equations of motion and the associated boundary conditions are discretized by using the generalized differential quadrature (GDQ) method and solved using the state space method. Consequently, the influences of geometry of hexagonal cells in the honeycomb core, porosity, power-law index, geometry of trapezoidal plates, boundary conditions and bending effects of honeycomb core on the critical flutter aerodynamic pressure and stability boundaries of trapezoidal sandwich plates are studied in detail.