Influence of the Lateral Eigenstrains on the Transverse Displacement of Wide Beams

The present paper studies the influence of lateral eigenstrains on the transverse deflection of wide beams. We show that in this case a laterally nonuniform transverse displacement becomes notable; moreover, it turns out that the axial variation of the transverse displacement is significantly altered in comparison to the results obtained from beam theory. In order to derive a corrected analytical solution for the transverse displacement of wide beams, the latter are modeled as thin plates with induced eigenstrains in both in–plane directions. A Galerkin method is utilized to solve the plate equations, in which solutions for the transverse displacement resulting from beam theory are used as shape functions for the plate deflection. (© 2008 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)