Free and Forced Vibration of Rectangular Plates Using the Finite

Difference Method
Yousef S. Al Rjouba* and Osama Abdeljaberb
a

Civil Engineering Department, Jordan University of Science and Technology, P. O. 3030, Irbid,

Jordan.
b

Graduate Student, Civil Engineering Department, Jordan University of Science and Technology, P. O.

3030, Irbid, Jordan.

ABSTRACT
This paper presents a finite difference method to solve free and forced
vibration problems of rectangular plates with differing boundary conditions. The
natural frequencies are obtained from the peaks of the free vibration response in the
frequency domain by exciting the plate with an initial displacement. The free
vibration response in the time domain is calculated using the finite difference method.
This is then converted to the frequency domain using Fourier transform. In this paper,
the plate is subjected to various dynamic loadings, namely, a step function,
rectangular and triangular loads, and a sinusoidal harmonic loading. The present
results are compared to analytical and numerical solutions available in the literature.
The results obtained are in good agreement with those of exact and numerical results
available in the literature.

KeywordsDynamic loadings, Finite difference method, Natural frequency,

Plate.
___________________________________________
*

Corresponding author. E-mail: ysalrjoub@just.edu.jo, Tel: +962 795204911, Fax: +962 2 70950185

Introduction and literature review

Plate elements are being used increasingly in various fields of engineering,
especially in aerospace, mechanical, civil, and hydraulic structures. The analysis of
free and forced vibration of rectangular plates is highly significant in the performance
of such structures. As a result, much research has been conducted to determine the
dynamic plate behavior. Leissa (1969, 1973) presents comprehensive and accurate
analytical results of the free vibration of rectangular plates with differing boundary
conditions. Twenty-two cases are considered, based on the possible combinations of
clamped, simply-supported, and free-edge conditions. An exact solution is obtained
for six cases having two opposite sides simply-supported. The remaining 15 cases are
analyzed using the Ritz method, with 36 terms containing the products of beam
functions. An approximate solution for the free vibration of rectangular plates using
the Rayleigh-Ritz method has been obtained by several researchers (Leissa, 2005;
Ilanko, 2009; Young, 1950; Bassily and Dickinson, 1975; Bhat, 1985; Liew and Lam,
1991; Lim and Liew, 1995). Other researchers (Leung and Chan, 1998; Zienkiewicz
and Taylor, 1989; Reddy, 1993) used a finite element method. Eftehari and Jafari
(2012) presented a combined application of the Ritz and differential quadrature (DQ)
methods to solve the free and forced vibration of rectangular plates with differing
boundary conditions. Yang, et al. (2012) used the finite difference method to obtain
the complex natural frequencies for linear free vibration, bifurcation, and chaos for
forced nonlinear vibration of an axially moving plate. Gupta, et al. (2012) presented
the forced vibration of a non-homogeneous simply-supported-free-simply-supportedfree rectangular plate of variable thickness. An approximate formula is obtained to
estimate the maximum deflection of a rectangular plate subject to uniform harmonic
loading. Wang and Xu (2010) used discrete singular convolution (DSC) to analyze the
free vibration of beams, annular plates, and rectangular plates with free boundary
edges. This method is examined using eight examples of free vibration of beams,
annular plates, and rectangular plates with differing boundary conditions. Duccechi, et
al. (2014) used the Von Karman equations to analyze the nonlinear vibration of thin
rectangular plates. The eigenmodes of a fully clamped plate are calculated based on a
fast converging solution strategy. The nonlinear dynamic of the first two modes, both
in the free and forced regimes, is taken into consideration. A closed form solution of
the natural frequencies and the corresponding mode shapes of thin plates with any

type of boundary condition is obtained by Xing and Liu (2009), using a dual method.
A closed form solution for the free vibrations of rectangular Mindlin plates with any
boundary condition is proposed by Xing and Liu (2009), using a new twoeigenfunctions theory. The proposed theory is obtained by reformulating the three
classical eigenvalue differential equations of a Mindlin plate. Then, separation of
variables is used to solve the two differential equations, which are identical to those of
Kirchhoff plate theory, Timoshenko and Krieger (1959). Werfalli and Karoud (2012)
studied the free vibration of thin, isotropic rectangular plates with various edge
conditions using a Galerkin-based finite element method. A closed form solution for
the free vibration of rectangular thin plates with three edge conditions, namely fully
simply-supported, fully clamped, and two opposite edges simply supported and the
other two edges clamped, is obtained by Wu, et al (2007), using Bessel functions.
Njoku, et al (2013) used the peculiar shape functions of the Taylor series, along with
Galerkin's method, to determine the natural frequencies of a fully clamped, isotropic,
thin rectangular plate. An analytical solution of the free vibration of a completely
simply supported rectangular Kirchhoff plate is obtained by Bahrami, et al. (2008),
using a wave propagation approach. Jain, et al. (1973) studied the free vibration of
rectangular plates having parabolically varying thickness, with two simply-supported
parallel edge conditions, based on the classical theory of plates. The Frobenius
method is used to solve the equation of motion. As a result of the product of an
infinite series and a function satisfying the boundary conditions at two simply
supported parallel edges, the deflection of the plate is obtained accordingly. Numayr,
et al (2004) used the finite difference method to solve the free vibration of composite
plates with differing boundary conditions. In their study, the effects of shear
deformation and rotary inertia are included. Yeh, et al. (2006) analyzed the free
vibrations of clamped and simply- supported rectangular thin plates using the finite
difference and differential transformation methods. The order of the differential
transformation, the number of sub-domain spaces, the variable conditions, and the
type of initial condition are used as investigative parameters.
It is clear form the previously outlined literature that the dynamic behavior of
rectangular plate subjected to impact loading is very important. In this paper, an
attempt to understand the dynamic behavior of rectangular plates with differing
boundary conditions using the finite difference method to perform dynamic analysis is

made. In this paper, Fourier transform is used to convert the free vibration response
from the time domain, obtained by the finite difference method, to the frequency
domain, thereby obtaining the natural frequencies. In the forced vibration case, the
rectangular plate is subjected to various impact loadings, such as, constant force,
rectangular, triangular, and sinusoidal harmonic. The natural frequencies are obtained
for plates with differing boundary conditions and are compared to exact and
numerical results available in the literature. The dynamic response in the forced
vibration regime is studied.

Mathematical Model of a Plate

Consider an isotropic, elastic, rectangular Kirchhoff plate of thickness h, lengths a
and b in the x- and y-directions, respectively, as shown in Fig. 1. The plate has mass
density , Young's modulus E, Poisson's ratio , and flexural rigidity D

Eh 3
.
12(1 2 )

The differential equation of motion for forced vibration is given by [20] as:
4 w(x, y,t)
4 w(x, y,t) 4 w(x, y,t)
2 w(x, y,t)
D

h
p(x, y,t)

4
2
2
4
2

(1)

where w(x,y,t), and p(x,y,t) are the transverse deflection of the plate and the
dynamic loadings applied, respectively.
Four types of dynamic loadings are considered, namely, a step function of infinite
duration, a rectangular load of finite (t d=0.1 sec) duration, a triangular load of finite
(td=0.1 sec) duration, and a sinusoidal harmonic loading of finite duration (t d=0.1 sec),
Fig. 2.
In this study, a plate with six different boundary conditions are considered,
namely, SSSS, SCSS, SCSC, CCCC, CCCS, and CCSS, where S refer to a simplysupported edge and C to clamped edge. The boundary conditions for simplysupported edge can be written as,

w(x, y,t)

2 w(x, y,t)
2 w(x, y,t)

0 at x=0 or a,
x 2
y 2

 2 w(x, y,t)
2 w(x, y,t)
w(x, y,t)

0 at y=0 or b.
y 2
x 2
and for a clamped edge as,
w(x, y,t)

w(x, y,t)
0 at x=0 or a,
x

w(x, y,t)

w(x, y,t)
0 at y=0 or b.
y

Equation (1) can be written in a finite difference form, Fig. 3, as:

h 4
20
w(i, j, t) 8w(i, j 1, t) 8w(i, j 1, t) 8w(i 1, j, t)
D2

8w(i 1, j, t) 2w(i 1, j 1, t) 2w(i 1, j 1, t) 2w(i 1, j 1, t)

2w(i 1, j 1, t) w(i, j 2, t) w(i, j 2, t) w(i 2, j, t)
w(i 2, j, t)

4
D

(2)

2h
h

p(i, j, t) t 2 w(i, j, t 1) t 2 w(i, j, t 2)

where is the size of the square mesh which is assumed to be equal to 0.02m in
this study, t is the time interval (0.001 sec), t is the time in sec, and i and j are the
node numbers in the x- and y-directions, respectively.
The free vibration of the plate is obtained by setting the external loads to zero. For
all plates considered in this study, the plate is excited by an initial displacement at
point (a/4, b/4), as shown in Fig. 4. The deflection at point (3a/4, 3b/4) is calculated
using the finite difference method. Fourier transform is then used to convert the
response from the time domain to the frequency domain. The natural frequencies are
measured from the peaks of the curve, see Fig. 5. To demonstrate the forced vibration
cases, equation (2) is used to calculate the deflection at the central point (i, j) of the
plate due to the various dynamic loadings, by representing that equation as:
w(i, j, t)

LHS
RHS

(3)

where LHS is the left hand side of equation (2), and RHS is right hand side of the
same equation.
For each time step, 0.001sec, the deflection is computed by equation (3), and the
corresponding response due to each dynamic loading is obtained. It should be

mentioned here that a Matlab program titled "Free and forced vibration of plates" was
written to demonstrate the present results.
Results and discussion
To demonstrate the free and forced vibrations, the material properties used in
this study are as follows: concrete Young's modulus, E 30 109 N/m 2 ; Poisson's
ratio, 0.3 ; mass density, 2800kg/m 3 ; and plate thickness, h 0.1m . Table
1-3 shows the first four non-dimensional frequency parameters, a 2 /D , for
rectangular plates with different values of a/b, namely, 2/3, 1, and 1.5, and various
boundary conditions, namely, SSSS, SCSS, and SCSC, respectively, calculated by the
present finite difference method and compared to the exact solution of Leissa (1969;
1973) and the numerical solution of Eftehari and Jafari (2012). It is clear from the
results that the present finite difference method agrees well with those of the exact
solution, Leissa (1969; 1973) and the numerical solution, Eftehari and Jafari (2012).
Table 4-6 also shows the first four non-dimensional frequency parameters,
a 2 /D , for CCCC, CCCS, and CCSS rectangular plates, respectively, with

aspect ratio values of 2/3, 1, and 1.5, calculated by the present finite difference
method and compared to the numerical solutions of Leissa (1969; 1973) and those of
Eftehari and Jafari (2012). Again, the present finite difference method results agree
well with those of the numerical solution obtained by Leissa (1969; 1973) and those
of Eftehari and Jafari (2012). It should be mentioned here that the non-dimensional
frequency parameter for a/b values of 2/3, and 1.5 is not available in Eftehari and
Jafari (2012). The proposed finite difference method is examined for the forced
vibration analysis of rectangular plates subjected to various dynamic loadings,
namely, constant force, rectangular force with time of duration, t d=0.1 sec, triangular
force with time of duration, t d=0.1 sec, and sinusoidal pulse with time of duration, t d=
0.1 sec, and frequency of 20 rad/sec. The amplitude of all dynamic loadings is
assumed to be 20 kN with time step, t 0.001sec . Figures 6-11 show the central
displacement of a square plate with various boundary conditions, namely, SSSS,
SCSS, SCSC, CCCC, CCCS, and CCSS, respectively. It is clear from the results that
the central displacement has a sudden jump at t d= 0.1 sec for rectangular, triangular,
and sinusoidal loadings. The central displacements for the case of a rectangular load
are higher than those due to sinusoidal and triangular loadings at all times, regardless

of the boundary conditions. The response for all plates will go to zero, except for the
case of constant load. By comparing the results of Fig. 6 with those of Fig. 9, one sees
that the rate of convergence of the response to zero for SSSS plates is slower than that
of CCCC plates. The central displacements of plates having two opposite simply
supported edges, namely, SSSS, SCSS, and SCSC is higher than those of plates not
having two opposite simply supported edges, namely, CCCC, CCCS, and CCSS,
compare Figures 6-8 with Figures 9-11.
Conclusions
In this paper, the free and forced vibration of rectangular plates is studied
using the finite difference method. Six different cases of rectangular plates are
considered based on their boundary conditions. Fourier transform is used to convert
the time response obtained by the finite difference method to the frequency domain
for an initially displaced plate. The corresponding natural frequencies of the
rectangular plates are obtained. The dynamic behavior of rectangular plates is studied
in this paper by subjecting them to various dynamic loadings. The results obtained in
this study are in good agreement with exact and numerical results available in the
literature.
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Printing Office, 1969.
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287 (2005) 961978.
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Acta Mechnics 225 (2014), 213232.
[18] Y. Xing, B. Liu, New exact solutions for free vibrations of rectangular thin plates
by symplectic dual method, Acta Mech Sin (2009) 25:265270.
[19] Y. Xing, B. Liu, Closed form solutions for free vibrations of rectangular Mindlin
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Table 1 Natural frequency parameter for SSSS plates.

Aspect ratio
Mode number
Present Solution
a/b
1
14.337
2
27.371
2/3
3
44.315
4
48.226
1
19.359
1
2
49.043
3
49.043
4
78.207
1
32.258
1.5
2
61.584
3
99.709
4
108.509

Table 2 Natural frequency parameter for SCSS plates.

Aspect ratio
Mode number
Present Solution
a/b
1
15.641
2
30.612
2/3
3
44.415
4
53.438
1
23.461
1
2
50.832
3
58.652
4
84.719
1
42.697
1.5
2
67.978
3
115.613
4
118.726

Table 3 Natural frequency parameter for SCSC plates.

Aspect ratio
Mode number
Present Solution
a/b
1
16.428
2
34.390
2/3
3
44.466
4
59.857
1
27.371
1
2
53.266
3
67.857
4
91.235
1
54.273
1.5
2
76.722
3
121.560
4
141.078

Exact

Ritz and DQ

Leissa

Eftekhari, Jafari

14.256
27.416
43.865
49.348
19.739
49.348
49.348
78.957
32.076
61.685
98.696
111.033

N.A.
19.739
49.348
49.348
78.957
N.A.

Exact

Ritz and DQ

Leissa

Eftekhari, Jafari

15.578
31.072
44.564
55.393
23.646
51.674
58.646
86.135
42.528
69.003
116.267
120.996

N.A.
23.646
51.674
58.646
86.135
N.A.

Exact

Ritz and DQ

Leissa

Eftekhari, Jafari

17.373
35.345
45.429
62.054
28.951
54.743
69.327
94.585
56.348
78.984
123.172
146.268

N.A.
28.951
54.743
69.327
94.585
N.A.

Table 4 Natural frequency parameter for CCCC plates.

Aspect ratio
a/b

2/3

1.5

Mode number

Present Solution

1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4

27.371
41.707
62.562
63.865
36.494
72.989
72.989
105.574
61.585
93.841
140.765
143.696

Ritz

Ritz and DQ

Leissa

Eftekhari, Jafari

27.010
41.716
66.143
66.552
35.992
73.413
73.413
108.270
60.772
93.860
148.820
149.740

35.985
73.393
73.393
108.217

Ritz

Ritz and DQ

Leissa

Eftekhari, Jafari

N.A.

N.A.

Table 5 Natural frequency parameter for CCCS plates.

Aspect ratio
a/b

2/3

1.5

Mode number

Present Solution

1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4

25.412
37.797
61.255
64.366
31.281
62.552
71.686
99.056
47.339
84.437
125.036
145.230

25.861
38.102
60.325
65.516
31.829
63.347
71.084
100.830
48.167
85.507
123.990
143.990

N.A.
31.826
63.331
71.076
100.792
N.A.

Table 6 Natural frequency parameter for CCSS plates.

Aspect ratio
a/b

2/3

1.5

Mode number
1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4

Present Solution
19.550
33.887
54.742
56.045
27.371
59.955
61.258
91.237
43.989
76.246
123.167
126.098

Ritz

Ritz and DQ

Leissa

Eftekhari, Jafari

19.952
34.024
54.370
57.517
27.056
60.544
60.791
92.865
44.893
76.554
122.330
129.410

N.A.
27.054
60.544
60.794
92.853
N.A.

Figure 1 Thin rectangular plate geometry and coordinate system

F(t)

F(t)

F0

F0

(b)

(a)

td

F(t)

F(t)

F0

F0

(c)

td

td

(d)

Figure 2 Dynamic loading functions (a) constant, (b) rectangular, (c) triangular,
(d) sinusoidal.

Figure 3 Plate mesh numbering in x-, y-, and t-coordinates.

Figure 4 Initially displaced plate.

Figure 5 Calculation of the non-dimensional frequency using Fourier transform,

for an SSSS plate.

Figure 6 Central displacement versus time for an SSSS plate for various
dynamic loadings.

Figure 7 Central displacement versus time for an SCSS plate for various
dynamic loadings.

Figure 8 Central displacement versus time for an SCSC plate for various
dynamic loadings.

Figure 9 Central displacement versus time for an CCCC plate for various
dynamic loadings.

Figure 10 Central displacement versus time for an CCCS plate for various
dynamic loadings.

Figure 11 Central displacement versus time for an CCSS plate for various
dynamic loadings.