Plane piezothermoelastic response of a hybrid laminate : a benchmark problem

Abstract Cylindrical bending of a composite plate, constructed of both orthotropic and isotropic thermoelastic layers in combination with orthorhombic piezoelectric layers, is studied in this paper. A recently derived exact analytical formulation is employed to obtain a benchmark solution for the case of thermal and electric-potential surface loadings. A high-order planestrain analysis that accounts for transverse normal and shear deformation is also presented. Comparison is made of the displacement and stress distributions found using the high-order and classical bending theories with the piezothermoelasticity results.