Abstract
The free vibration problem of cantilevered composite plates of arbitrary planform is solved by an extension of the Ritz method. The lamination of fibrous composite material is included in the analysis by obtaining the equivalent bending rigidities. The cantilever plate is assumed to have a straight clamped edge and free edges along an arbitrary boundary, and the boundary conditions are accommodated by use of double power series for assumed deflections. In the numerical study, four typical plate planforms are considered, and the natural frequencies are calculated for plates made of boron-epoxy material. The dependence of the free vibration characteristics on the lamination parameters, e.g., fiber orientation and number of layers, is discussed.
