Damping of flexural vibrations in rectangular plates by slots of power-law profile

It has been shown in our previous publications that the addition of power-law profiled wedges to edges of rectangular plates or strips results in substantial increase in damping of resonant flexural vibrations in plates or strips due to the acoustic black hole effect associated with power-law wedges. One of the problems faced by this method of damping is having the wedge tip exposed on the outer edge of the plate or strip. One of the solutions to the problems listed above is to move the wedges inside a plate, so that they form edges of power-law slots within the plate. The present paper reports the results of the experimental investigations into the effects of such slots on damping flexural vibrations. Four experimental investigations are described: the effect of power-law tapered slots on vibration damping in steel and composite plates, the effect of positioning of slots in a plate, and finally the effect of a combined slotted plate. The obtained experimental results show that introducing power-law profiled slots within plates is an effective method of damping flexural vibrations, which is comparable with the method using power-law wedges at plate edges.