Abstract
This paper presents analytical results of forced transverse vibration of a column with a mass attached at free-end subjected to a tangential follower force and a transverse distributed excitation force, that is a simplified model of some structures in civil and mechanical engineering, e.g., a column of a suspension bridge, a launched rocket in the atmosphere. Because the tangential follower force is nonconservative, it is very difficult to get the analytical solution of the problem by usually-used analysis methods with which the adjoint boundary value problem can not be directly obtained. However, by applying the finite integral transform technique, we directly obtained the adjoint boundary value problem in the analysis process, and successfully obtained the analytical solution of the column’s vibration excited by the transverse distributed force.