Some exact solutions for the bending of beams with spatially stochastic stiffness (Q675558)

A new method is developed to obtain exact solutions for first and second moments of displacements for statically determinate beams that have spatially random stiffness. The method is based on the full probabilistic characterization of the random stiffness so that the solutions are valid for any value of the coefficient of variation of the stiffness. The deterministic governing equations and boundary conditions derived for both first and second moments allow to determine exact solutions for the mean and covariance functions of the displacements.