AN EXACT SOLUTION FOR THE BENDING OF POINT-SUPPORTED ORTHOTROPIC RECTANGULAR THIN PLATES

A closed series solution is proposed for the bending of point-supported orthotropic rectangular thin plates. The positions of support points and the distribution of transverse load are arbitrary. If the number of simply supported points gradually increases the solution can infinitely approach to Navier’s solution. For the square plate simply supported on the middle of each edge and free at each corner, the results are very close to the numerical solutions in the past.