Structural modeling, vibration analysis and optimal viscoelastic layer characterization of adaptive sandwich beams with electrorheological fluid core

• Timoshenko beam theory has been employed to derive the governing equations of motion of variable structure sandwich beams.
• A consistent procedure is proposed for optimal characterization of the viscoelastic core.
• Experimental ASTM E756 method is combined with the computational particle swarm optimization (PSO) to estimate and update the complex shear modulus of the viscoelastic layer.
• The effects of applied electric fields and thickness of the layers on natural frequencies and modal loss factors are investigated.

This paper deals with the vibration analysis of adaptive sandwich beams with electrorheological fluid (ERF) core. In this study, Timoshenko beam theory has been employed to derive the governing equations of motion of variable structure sandwich beams. A consistent procedure is proposed for optimal characterization of the viscoelastic core. Herein, the experimental ASTM E756 method is combined with the computational particle swarm optimization (PSO) to estimate and update the complex shear modulus of the viscoelastic layer. The effects of thickness of the layers and applied electric fields on natural frequencies and modal loss factors are investigated.