Abstract
Nonlinear vibration and dynamic stability analyses of distributed structural systems have often been conducted for their low-dimensional spatially discretized models, and the results obtained from the low-dimensional models may not accurately represent the behaviors of the distributed systems. In this work the incremental harmonic balance method is used to handle a variety of problems pertaining to determining periodic solutions of high-dimensional models of distributed structural systems. The methodology is demonstrated on a translating tensioned beam with a stationary load subsystem and some related systems. With sufficient numbers of included trial functions and harmonic terms, convergent and accurate results are obtained in all the cases. The effect of nonlinearities due to the vibration-dependent friction force between the translating beam and the stationary load subsystem, which results from nonproportionality of the load parameters, decreases as the number of included trial functions increases. A low-dimensional spatially discretized model of the nonlinear distributed system can yield quantitatively and qualitatively inaccurate predictions. The methodology can be applied to other nonlinear and/or time-varying distributed structural systems.
