Abstract
Linear viscoelastic structures are characterized by dissipative forces that depend on the history of the velocity response via hereditary damping functions. The free motion equation leads to a nonlinear eigenvalue problem characterized by a frequency-dependent damping matrix. In the present paper, a novel and efficient numerical method for the computation of the eigenvalues of linear and proportional or lightly non-proportional viscoelastic structures is developed. The central idea is the construction of two complex-valued functions of a complex variable, whose fixed points are precisely the eigenvalues. This important property allows the use of these functions in a fixed-point iterative scheme. With help of some results in fixed point theory, necessary conditions for global and local convergence are provided. It is demonstrated that the speed of convergence is linear and directly depends on the level of induced damping. In addition, under certain conditions the recursive method can also be used for the calculation of non-viscous real eigenvalues. In order to validate the mathematical results, two numerical examples are analyzed, one for single degree-of-freedom systems and another for multiple ones.
