Implicit and explicit secular equations for Rayleigh waves in two-dimensional anisotropic media

•Rayleigh wave propagation in two-dimensional generally anisotropic media is discussed.•Implicit and explicit secular equations for Rayleigh waves are derived.•Results are in good correspondence with formerly published FE and experimental data.

This paper is concerned with the derivation of implicit and explicit secular equations for Rayleigh waves polarized in a plane of symmetry of an anisotropic linear elastic medium. It has been confirmed, in accord with Ting’s paper [2], that the Rayleigh waves propagate with no geometric dispersion. Numerical evaluations of both the implicit and explicit equations give the same values of Rayleigh wave velocities. In the case of orthotropic material (thin composites) it has been found that Rayleigh wave velocity depends significantly (as with bulk waves) on the directions of principal material axes. For the same material model the analytical solutions, based on implicit and explicit secular equations, were compared against the finite element and experimental data that had been published by Cerv et al. [4] in 2010. It emerged that the theory was in accordance with the experiment.