The decoupling of second-order linear systems with a singular mass matrix

It was demonstrated in earlier work that a nondefective, linear dynamical system with an invertible mass matrix in free or forced motion may be decoupled in the configuration space by a real and isospectral transformation. We extend this work by developing a procedure for decoupling a linear dynamical system with a singular mass matrix in the configuration space, transforming the original differential-algebraic system into decoupled sets of real, independent, first- and second-order differential equations. Numerical examples are provided to illustrate the application of the decoupling procedure.