Modeling of hydroelastic oscillations for a channel wall possessing a nonlinear elastic support

The paper deals with the mathematical model formulation for studying the nonlinear hydro-elastic response of the narrow channel wall supported by a spring with cubic nonlinearity and interacting with a pulsating viscous liquid filling the channel. In contrast to the known approaches, within the framework of the proposed mathematical model, the inertial and dissipative properties of the viscous incompressible liquid and the restoring force nonlinearity of the supporting spring were simultaneously taken into account. The mathematical model was an equations system for the coupled plane hydroelasticity problem, including the motion equations of a viscous incompressible liquid, with the corresponding boundary conditions, and the channel wall motion equation as a single-degree-of-freedom model with a cubic nonlinear restoring force. Initially, the viscous liquid dynamics was investigated within the framework of the hydrodynamic lubrication theory, i. e. without taking into account the liquid motion inertia. At the next stage, the iteration method was used to take into account the motion inertia of the viscous liquid. The distribution laws of the hydrodynamic parameters for the viscous liquid in the channel were found which made it possible to determine its reaction acting on the channel wall. As a result, it was shown that the original hydroelasticity problem is reduced to a single nonlinear equation that coincides with the Duffing equation. In this equation, the damping coefficient is determined by the liquid physical properties and the channel geometric dimensions, and taking into account the liquid motion inertia lead to the appearance of an added mass. The nonlinear equation study for hydroelastic oscillations was carried out by the harmonic balance method for the main frequency of viscous liquid pulsations. As a result, the primary steady-state hydroelastic response for the channel wall supported by a spring with softening or hardening cubic nonlinearity was found. Numerical modeling of the channel wall hydroelastic response showed the possibility of a jumping change in the amplitudes of channel wall oscillations, and also made it possible to assess the effect of the liquid motion inertia on the frequency range in which these amplitude jumps are observed.