Natural Vibrations and Stability of Elliptical Cylindrical Shells Containing Fluid

Abstract

The paper deals with a three-dimensional problem on natural vibrations and stability of thin-walled cylindrical shells with arbitrary cross sections, containing a quiescent or flowing ideal compressible fluid. The motion of compressible non-viscous fluid is described by a wave equation, which together with the impermeability condition and corresponding boundary conditions is transformed using the Bubnov–Galerkin method. A mathematical formulation of the problem of thin-walled structure dynamics has been developed based on the variational principle of virtual displacements. Simulation of shells with arbitrary cross sections is performed under the assumption that a curvilinear surface is approximated to sufficient accuracy by a set of plane rectangular elements. The strains are calculated using the relations of the theory of thin shells based on the Kirchhoff–Love hypothesis. The developed finite element algorithm has been employed to investigate the influence of the fluid level, the ratio of the ellipse semi-axes and types of boundary conditions on the eigenfrequencies, vibration modes and the boundary of hydroelastic stability of thin-walled circular and elliptical cylindrical shells interacting with a quiescent or flowing fluid.