On two equivalent thin plate finite elements

The 9 df thin plate element of Mohr and Mohr uses cubic interpolation to obtain values of w at the third points of the element sides, in turn interpolating from these and the vertex values within the element. Recently this element has been modified and successfully applied to 'potential' problems. Subsequently it was found that the interpolations of the element of Bazeley et al. (1965, 1968) gave identical results for potential problems. In the present paper it is shown that this is because the interpolations of the two elements are exactly equivalent. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.