Damping properties of bi-dimensional sandwich structures with multi-layered frequency-dependent visco-elastic cores

The aim of this paper is to present a finite element model based on first order shear theory (zig-zag approach) to compute the damping characteristics of sandwich structures with multi-layered frequency-dependent viscoelastic cores. The model is validated versus a layerwise finite element model and used to study damping and rigidity of a laminated glass configuration with a multi-layered visco-elastic core composed of acoustic PVB and PVB. It is shown that the rigidity index of the structure (defined as the adimensionalized inverse of the maximal transverse displacement under a static load) evolves linearly with the viscoelastic layers’ thicknesses and quadratically versus elastic layer’s thickness. The first mode damping and resonant frequency show a non monotonous behaviour. In particular, the existence of an optimal faces thickness for damping is shown while a quadratic behaviour of frequency versus acoustic PVB layer thickness is reported.