Effects of local thinning defects and stepped thickness for free vibration of cylindrical shells using a symplectic exact solution approach

Based on the Reissner shell theory and a new symplectic method, an analytical exact solution approach is presented in this paper to deal with free vibration of stepped cylindrical shells with thickness variations in both the axial and circumferential directions. Such cylindrical shells are often applied for designing aeronautics and space structures and hence any local defects and local geometric variations will result in significant design...