Multi-objective optimal design of hybrid viscoelastic/composite sandwich beams by using the generalized differential quadrature method and the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II

In this study, the multi-objective optimal design of hybrid viscoelastic/composite sandwich beams for minimum weight and minimum vibration response is aimed. The equation of motion for linear vibrations of a multi-layer beam is derived by using the principle of virtual work in the most general form. These governing equations together with the boundary conditions are discretized by the generalized differential quadrature method (GDQM) in the frequency domain for the first time. Also, the time and temperature dependent properties of the viscoelastic materials are taken into consideration by a novel ten-parameter fractional derivative model that can realistically capture the response of these materials. The material variability is accounted for by letting an optimization algorithm choose a material freely out of four fiber-reinforced composite materials and five viscoelastic damping polymers for each layer. The design parameters, i.e., the orientation angles of the composites, layer thicknesses and the layer materials that give the set of optimal solutions, namely the Pareto frontier, is obtained for the three and nine-layered clamped-free sandwich beams by using a variant of the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithms (NSGA II).