SOME INSIGHTS INTO THE DYNAMICS OF DEFECTIVE STRUCTURES

As a general principle, it should be assumed that defective structures will exhibit nonlinear response behaviour. The primary activity of th e Cardiff research group over the last ten years has been the identifi cation of the types of non-linear phenomena encountered in the dynamic s of defective structures together with an estimation of their observa bility, albeit in a qualitative sense. A wide range of classical non-l inear effects from subharmonic oscillations to chaotic vibrations has been observed. It is argued that structural integrity assessment can b e enhanced by incorporating these non-linear effects into damage asses sment criteria.