Second‐order design sensitivity analysis of mechanical system dynamics

Abstract

Abstract Dependence of dynamic response of nonlinear mechanical systems on design variables is analysed. An adjoint variable method is used to derive first‐ and second‐order derivatives of measures of dynamic response with respect to design variables. A computational algorithm is presented for numerical calculation of first and second design derivatives. A simple oscillator example is solved analytically and by the adjoint variable method, with identical results. A burst fire automatic weapon mechanism with linear and nonlinear damping is treated numerically. It is shown that quadratic appriximations of dynamic response, using results of second‐order design sensitivity analysis, can be substantially better than conventional linear approximations.