Dynamic instability of a circular cylindrical shell carrying a top mass under base excitation: Experiments and theory

The present paper is focused on the experimental and theoretical analysis of circular cylindrical shells under base excitation. The shell axis is vertical, it is clamped at the base and connected to a rigid body on the top; the base provides a vertical seismic-like excitation. The goal is to investigate the shell response when a resonant harmonic forcing is applied: the first axisymmetric mode is excited around the resonance at relatively low frequency and low amplitude of excitation. A violent resonant phenomenon is experimentally observed as well as an interesting saturation phenomenon close to the previously mentioned resonance. A theoretical model is developed to reproduce the experimental evidence and provide an explanation of the complex dynamics observed experimentally; the model takes into account geometric shell nonlinearities, electrodynamic shaker equations and the shell shaker interaction.