Principal trajectories of forced vibrations for discrete and continuous systems (Q5948663)

The author shows some relations between linear normal modes and principal directions. He considers a linear \(n\)-degree-of-freedom forced system \(M\ddot{\mathbf x}+K\mathbf x=\mathbf p(\omega t)\), where \(\mathbf x(t)\in R^n\), \(M\) and \(K\) are constant mass and stiffness \(n\times n\)-matrices respectively, and \(\mathbf p(\omega t)\) is a periodic vector-force of period \(T=2\pi \) with respect to \(\omega t\) (the upper dot denotes differentiation with respect to time \(t\)). This system is reduced to the eigenvalue problem for a parameter \(\mu \) and for vector \(\mathbf q: -\omega^2 M\mathbf q+ K\mathbf q= \mu \mathbf q\). If \(\mathbf q=\mathbf v_s\) and \(\mu =\mu_s\) \((s=1,2,\dots,n)\) correspond to the \(s\)th eigenvalue, then \(\{\mathbf v_s\}_{s=1}^n\) determine the natural basis of forced vibrations. Principal trajectories of forced vibration of linear and nonlinear continuous systems, as stated above, are considered as such motions in which the system is equivalent to a Newtonian particle in the function space of system configurations. The corresponding ``effective mass'' of the particle gives physical characteristics of the system response, so that the zero effective mass is associated with resonance. It is shown that a two-degree-of-freedom system can possess an infinite discrete set of in-phase and out-of-phase forced vibrations of normal mode type. The corresponding forcing vector-functions obey the second Newton law due to the definition of principal trajectories.