Dynamic Response of Systems with Structural Damping

Abstract

The response of simple vibratory systems containing structural damping is studied analytically when the excitation is an impulse and when the excitation is stationary random vibration. It is found that in a strict sense the assumption of ideal structural damping represents a physically unrealizable model because a small precursor response occurs before the application of an impulsive load. For stationary random excitation exact solutions for the mean square response are compared with approximate solutions obtained from two increasingly accurate "equivalent viscous" substitutes for structural damping.