Abstract
Effect of initial stresses on dispersion relation for transverse surface waves circulating around a piezoelectric cylinder covered with perfectly conducting layers is investigated. Two overlay materials are considered: Cold and Aluminum. The piezoelectric substrate is considered to have the symmetry of a hexagonal crystal, and the layer is perfectly conducting. The dispersion equation has been given in the form of determinant involving Bessel functions. The roots of the dispersion equation give the values of the characteristic circular frequency parameters of the first three modes for various geometries. These roots are numerically calculated by "Bisection method iterations technique" and presented graphically for various thickness of the overlayer and for different values of the initial stress. The effects of the initial stress on the natural frequencies are illustrated on the figures. It is found that both the thickness of the overlayer and the initial stress have a substantial effect on the dispersion behavior. The results obtained in this paper may not only help us get insight into the electro-mechanical coupling behavior of the piezoelectric composites cylinders, but can also offer theoretical basis and meaningful suggestions for the design of piezoelectric probes and electro-acoustic devices in the nondestructive evaluation technology. Finally, the results are compared graphically when the overlay is Gold or Aluminum with some special cases which do not have initial stresses and electric field. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.