NON-LINEAR TRANSVERSE VIBRATIONS OF A SIMPLY SUPPORTED BEAM CARRYING CONCENTRATED MASSES

An Euler–Bernoulli beam carrying concentrated masses is considered to be a beam–mass system. The beam is simply supported at both ends. The non-linear equations of motion are derived including stretching due to immovable end conditions. The stretching introduces cubic non-linearities into the equations. Forcing and damping terms are also included. Exact solutions for the natural frequencies are given for the linear problem. For the non-linear problem, an approximate solution using a perturbation method is searched. Non-linear terms of the perturbation series appear as corrections to the linear problem. Amplitude and phase modulation equations are obtained. Non-linear free and forced vibrations are investigated in detail. The effect of the positions, magnitudes and number of the masses are investigated.