This study shows the free vibration response of functionally graded metal-ceramic sandwich plates for the validation of the frequency parameter according to classical plate theory (CPT) using ANSYS software by considering the finite element solution approach. The faces of the functionally graded sandwich plate have layers, which are considered to be isotropic. Volume fraction, modulus of elasticity, density, and Poisson’s ratio of the different faces of the functionally graded material (FGM) plate are presumed to differ with power law distribution. For this study, the Functionally graded plate is symmetric from the middle plane. The core layer or the middle layer is ceramic and has an isotropic and homogenous nature. The model chosen for the analysis is 1:1:1 having same thickness ratio for top, core, and bottom, and frequency variation with different volume index is obtained for the clamped boundary condition considering classical plate theory. Impacts of change in aspect ratio, volume fraction index over frequency have been studied. Variation of frequency for different mode shapes is studied. Also, the impact of nodes and elements on frequency is investigated.

The present study focuses on the thermo-mechanical bending investigation of functionally graded material (FGM) sandwich plates with temperature-dependent material properties. For engineering applications, FGMs are typically made of metal and ceramic, where metal provides high rigidity and ceramic delivers high thermal resistivity. Material properties of FGM sandwich plate are considered temperature dependent and assumed to be continuously graded in thickness direction. Sigmoid and power law distributions are adopted to obtain the smooth and continuous variation of mechanical and thermal properties of FGM plate. To carry out thermo-mechanical bending, one dimensional heat conduction equation is utilized to obtain temperature variation in thickness direction. Sinusoidal shear deformation theory (SSDT) is a type of non-polynomial shear deformation theory which accounts for sinusoidal distribution of transverse shear stress and satisfies the traction free boundary condition. The governing equations for thermo-mechanical bending analysis for FGM sandwich plates are derived using Hamilton’s variational principle following SSDT and Navier’s solution. Closed form solutions are obtained to predict centre deflection, and normal and shear stresses of simply supported FGM sandwich plates. The effect of temperature-dependent material properties, power and sigmoid law, gradation index, temperature difference, side to thickness ratio, and aspect ratio over central deflection, normal stress, and shear stress are carried out and analysed. It may be concluded from the analysis that temperature-dependent material properties and gradation index for power and sigmoid law considerably influence the central deflection, normal stress, and shear stress. A good agreement amongst the obtained and available results of existing shear deformation theory is found to validate the accuracy of the SSDT

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate the bending analysis of metal (Ti-6Al-4V)-ceramic (ZrO) functionally graded material (FGM) sandwich plate with material property gradation along length and thickness direction under thermo-mechanical loading using inverse trigonometric shear deformation theory (ITSDT). FGM sandwich plate with a ceramic core and continuous variation of material properties has been modelled using Voigt’s micro-mechanical model following the power law distribution method. The impact of bi-directional gradation of material properties over the bending response of FGM plate under thermo-mechanical loading has been investigated in this work. Design/methodology/approach: In this study, gradation of material properties for FGM plates is considered along length and thickness directions using Voigt’s micromechanical model following the power law distribution method. This type of FGM is called bi-directional FGMs (BDFGM). Mechanical and thermal properties of BDFGM sandwich plates are considered temperature-dependent in the present study. ITSDT is a non-polynomial shear deformation theory which requires a smaller number of field variables for modelling of displacement function in comparison to poly-nominal shear deformation theories which lead to a reduction in the complexity of the problem. In the present study, ITSDT has been utilized to obtain the governing equations for thermo-mechanical bending of simply supported uni-directional FGM (UDFGM) and BDFGM sandwich plates. Analytical solution for bending analysis of rectangular UDFGM and BDFGM sandwich plates has been carried out using Hamilton’s principle. Findings: The bending response of the BDFGM sandwich plate under thermo-mechanical loading has been analysed and discussed. The present study shows that centre deflection, normal stress and shear stress are significantly influenced by temperature-dependent material properties, bi-directional gradation exponents along length and thickness directions, geometrical parameters, sandwich plate layer thickness, etc. The present investigation also reveals that bi-directional FGM sandwich plates can be designed to obtain thermo-mechanical bending response with an appropriate selection of gradation exponents along length and thickness direction. Non-dimensional centre deflection of BDFGM sandwich plates decreases with increasing gradation exponents in length and thickness directions. However, the non-dimensional centre deflection of BDFGM sandwich plates increases with increasing temperature differences. Originality/value: For the first time, the FGM sandwich plate with the bi-directional gradation of material properties has been considered to investigate the bending response under thermo-mechanical loading. In the literature, various polynomial shear deformation theories like first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT), third-order shear deformation theory (TSDT) and higher-order shear deformation theory (HSDT) have been utilized to obtain the governing equation for bending response under thermo-mechanical loading; however, non-polynomial shear deformation theory like ITSDT has been used for the first time to obtain the governing equation to investigate the bending response of BDFGM. The impact of bi-directional gradation and temperature-dependent material properties over centre deflection, normal stress and shear stress has been analysed and discussed.