TRANSIENT-RESPONSE OF AN INFINITE ELASTIC MEDIUM CONTAINING A SPHERICAL CAVITY WITH AND WITHOUT A SHELL EMBEDMENT

The analytical solution is obtained for the transient response to an a xisymmetric and non-torsional surface load of an infinite, isotropic, elastic medium containing a spherical cavity with and without a thin e lastic shell embedment using the Residual Variable Method. The main ad vantage of the present approach is that it eliminates the computationa l problems arising in the existing methods which are primarily based o n the Fourier transformation technique. Extensive numerical results fo r the displacements and stresses at different locations are presented graphically for the case of a radial, Heaviside loading. Copyright (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.