• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.9 no.4 s.33
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• pp.601-609
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• 1997

Bending and vibration results for a laminated plate base on a simplified higher-order plate theory with four variables are presented. Assuming a constant in-plane rotation tensor through the thickness in Reddy's higher-order shear deformation theory it is shown that a simpler higher-order theory can be obtained with the reduction of one variable without significant loss in the accuracy. This simple higher-order shear deformation theory is then used for predicting the natural frequencies and deflection of simply-supported laminated composite plates. The results obtained for antisymmetrical laminated composite plates compare favorably with third-order and first-order shear deformation theory. The information presented should be useful to composite-structure designers, to researchers seeking to obtain better correlation between theory and experiment and to numerical analysts in checking out their programs.