Speaker
Description
Contemporary issues in the dynamics of engineering systems are becoming increasingly complex due to growing demands for reliability, durability, and efficiency in structural designs. One of the key aspects of analyzing such systems is the consideration of uncertainties, which may arise from various sources, such as material variability, geometric imperfections, or difficulties in accurately modeling boundary conditions and loads. In dynamic analysis, uncertainties have a particularly significant impact on critical parameters such as natural frequencies, damping coefficients, and dynamic responses to external excitations. There are various approaches to modeling uncertainties, including probabilistic and non-probabilistic methods. Probabilistic approaches, although widely used, require extensive data, which may not always be available. In such cases, non-probabilistic approaches, such as modeling with bounded parameter ranges, allow for obtaining satisfactory estimations even in the absence of a known probability distribution of uncertainties. In the context of systems with elements made of viscoelastic materials, estimating the probability distribution of design parameter uncertainties can be particularly challenging, while determining their upper and lower bounds is often feasible. This study presents a dynamic analysis of systems with viscoelastic elements whose parameters are uncertain. The proposed method, which combines interval analysis and the Laplace transform, is applied to systems with viscoelastic elements for the first time. The mechanical behavior of viscoelastic elements is described using rheological models. Design parameters are represented as interval numbers, where the lower and upper bounds of the parameter values are known. The Laplace transform is employed to convert the equations of motion into a linear system of equations, while the inverse Laplace transform is used to obtain the dynamic response of the system. To reduce overestimation, a typical drawback of interval analysis, the element-by-element method is applied, and the efficiency of this approach is analyzed. The effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated through numerical examples, and the obtained results are compared with those derived using the vertex method.
