A review and critique of theories for piezoelectric laminates

This paper presents a three‐dimensional (3‐D) complete field solution for active laminates based on a modal, Fourier series solution approach that is used to compute all the through thickness electromechanical fields near the dominant resonance frequency of a beam plate with two piezoelectric (sensor and actuator) and one structural layers. Then a detailed review of the extant laminate models used for piezoelectric laminates emphasizing the underlying assumptions in each case is presented. The nonzero, through thickness field components are computed under these assumptions. The results of the 3‐D model and FSDT model are compared for two aspect ratios (AR thickness to width of layers). An AR of 20 is at the limit of FSDT and an AR of 50 well within the assumptions of FSDT. It is concluded that for moderate aspect ratios, several of the approximations of FSDT are questionable at resonance frequencies, resulting in large errors in the estimation of the elastic and electric field components.