Viscoelastic Modeling for Structural Analysis

<p>The theory of viscoelasticity has been built up as a mechanical framework for modeling important aspects of the delayed behavior of a wide range of materials. This book, primarily intended for civil and mechanical engineering students, is devoted specifically to linear viscoelastic behavior within the small perturbation framework.<br /> <br /> The fundamental concepts of viscoelastic behavior are first presented from the phenomenological viewpoint of the basic creep and relaxation tests within the simple one-dimensional framework. The linearity and non-ageing hypotheses are introduced successively, with the corresponding expressions of the constitutive law in the form of Boltzmann’s integral operators and Riemann’s convolution products respectively. Applications to simple quasi-static processes underline the dramatic and potentially catastrophic consequences of not taking viscoelastic delayed behavior properly into account at the design stage.<br /> <br /> Within the three-dimensional continuum framework, the linear viscoelastic constitutive equation is written using compact mathematical notations and takes material symmetries into account. The general analysis of quasi-static linear viscoelastic processes enhances similarities with, and differences from, their elastic counterparts. Simple typical case studies illustrate the importance of an in-depth physical understanding of the problem at hand prior to its mathematical analysis.</p>