Free vibration analysis of sandwich shells with cutouts: An experimental and numerical study with artificial neural network modelling

This article investigates the free vibration and damping characteristics of cylindrical sandwich shells with cutouts using both experimental and numerical approaches. The effects of cutout shape, size, and position on the dynamic response of cylindrical sandwich shells are explored. Moreover, Artificial Neural Network (ANN) models are constructed to predict the dynamic behavior of the sandwich shell with a cutout. A user-friendly application, Sandwich Shell Vibration Analysis (SSVibA), is developed, incorporating the ANN models to predict the non-dimensionalized natural frequencies and modal loss factors of the sandwich shell under different shell geometries, boundary conditions and cutout configurations. The objective of the present research is to advance the understanding of the dynamic behavior of sandwich structures by integrating experimental investigations, numerical analyses, and ANN modeling.