A Modified Conical Beam Element

Based on Finite Element Analysis:

T. A. Vest
M. S. Darlow
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Aeronautical Engineering, and Mechanics,
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute,
Troy, NY 12180
Experimental Correlations
A portion of the results from a previous investigation into the structural behavior
of hollow conical sections has been used to develop a method of correcting the
conical beam element used in modern rotordynamic programs. The modification is
made by altering the local value of the Young's modulus so that the equations used
in the conical element produce a bending flexibility which corresponds to that
determined from detailed, three-dimensional finite element models. The use of this
modification produces substantial improvement in the prediction of the first five
natural frequencies of a hollow nonrotating shaft containing two opposed conical
sections, for a range of wall thicknesses. The modification exhibits a length de-
pendency which appears to be a main cause of the remaining discrepancies, though
it is pointed out that the procedure is only a partial implementation of a more
complete hybrid element to be presented later. Static experiments are also discussed,
and the verification of a unique behavior characteristic of steep tapered sections is
reported.

Introduction
Tapered, or conical sections appear commonly in turbo- angle increases, the significance of this violation will also in-
machinery, occasionally forming a significant portion of the crease, as the normal component of unsupported axial stress
overall geometry. See Fig. 1 for some examples of conical becomes greater. Should the wall thickness decrease, however,
geometries appearing in modern gas turbine rotors. For the the ability for the nonplanar stresses to be supported within
dynamic characteristics, i.e., critical speeds and forced re- the wall diminishes, thus resulting in what is commonly known
sponses, to be predicted accurately, an accurate mass-elastic as shell behavior.
model [1] of these rotors must be established, as well as proper A recent work performed by the authors [2] involved the
bearing and damping parameters. A valid mass-elastic model
is one which matches, as closely as possible, the measured
natural frequencies and mode shapes, or modal model, of the
rotor alone, independent of rotation or bearing effects. In
order to accomplish this, the bending and shear behavior of
each section of the rotor must be accurately represented. A
difficulty arises from the fact that Timoshenko beam theory,
which most accepted rotordynamic codes in use today are based
upon, is not appropriate for shaft sections which contain sig-
nificant changes in diameter along their length. The reason for
this is illustrated in Fig. 2, where a differential element in a
conical section is shown. Using the assumption of Timoshenko
beam behavior, the axial stress variation due to a pure bending
load is shown to be linear. This distribution can be decomposed
into two separate components at the surface, one of which is Fig. 1 Examples of conical section geometries in gas turbine rotors
normal to the surface of the taper, here labeled a„. This com-
ponent has no means of being supported, and thus bending
and shear stresses are produced within the wall to provide static
equilibrium which requires a„ to be zero. These internal stresses
produce out-of-plane deformation, thus violating the planar
cross section assumption used in beam theory. As the taper
| Warped Cross
/ Section
Contributed by the Design Engineering Division for publication in the JOURNAL
OF VIBRATION AND ACOUSTICS. Manuscript received October 1989. Fig. 2 Conical section stress distribution

3 5 0 / V o l . 112, JULY 1990 Transactions of the A S M E

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Fig. 3(a) FE model used for flexibility study and (o) example of warping
deformation
use of 3D finite element, FE, models to study the behavior of
hollow conical sections in detail. It was expected that there
would exist a trend from beam-like to shell-like response as
wall thickness, and possibly angle, were varied. In order to
produce results which would be directly applicable to conical
sections in actual shafting, the FE models developed included
two cylindrical segments as shown in Fig. 3(a). Bending and
shear loads were prescribed at the end of the smaller cylindrical
section such that either a pure bending or pure shear load
resulted at the small end of the taper. The end of the larger
cylinder was clamped so as to provide a cantilever, and the
lengths of the straight sections were varied until no stress con-
centrations due to the loading or boundary conditions existed
at the cylinder-cone interfaces.
The goal of the modeling effort was to determine the ef-
fective bending and shear flexibilities of the conic section and
to compare these with those predicted by an exact beam and
a membrane shell theory, with the idea being to cast a hybrid
element. By prescribing unit loads, the terms of the flexibility
matrix, as given below, were determined. It was found that
for the "direct" terms, Sn and S22, the FE results showed
consistent trends between the beam and shell predictions as
the thickness was varied, while the "indirect" terms, S12 and
S21, showed somewhat volatile transitions.
Sn Sl2
S2i S22
The aberrant results were due primarily to the difficulty in
ascertaining a specific rotation or deflection value for each
face of the conic section. Since the faces were allowed to warp,
as shown in Fig. 3(ft), and there were no nodes located at the
centerline because the model was hollow, determining a single
value of rotation or deflection for an entire face could not be
accomplished directly. After many different assessment strat-
egies were compared, an averaging scheme using mid-plane
nodes was adopted. The off-diagonal terms displayed a much
greater sensitivity to the estimation method used than the di-
agonal terms since the indirect deformations were typically an
order of magnitude less than the direct ones.
From the results of the finite element analysis a complete
hybrid element was cast which related the extracted flexibility
matrix terms to those predicted by the beam and shell theories.
The current version of the hybrid element has proven difficult
to implement in its entirety into a rotordynamic code because
of the erratic behavior of the off-diagonal terms. This is due
in part to the polynomial interpolation method used for the
hybrid element. With several inflection points in their tran-
Nomenclature
a = taper angle (radians) A = L/RM
E = Youngs modulus (ML" 'T" 2 ) M = bending moment (ML2T~2)
v = T/RM RM = average mid-plane radius (L)
L = length (L) a = normal stress (ML"'T -2 )
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Comparison of Analytic and FE Flexibilities
0.0 0.2 0,4 0.6 O.B 1.0
T/RM
Fig. 4(a) Ratio of FE/beam conical section flexibility (b) definition of ij
sition curves, the off-diagonal terms may be better represented
by the use of a cubic spline fit. Further study on the hybrid
element will concentrate on establishing the most reliable
method of extraction and interpolation for these terms, such
that the complete element can be utilized.
At the present time, it is recognized that the dominant term,
for lateral shaft vibrations, is the rotation due to bending
moment, of S22. This term is deemed dominant since a given
change in its value will cause a much larger change in the effect
the conic section has on the overall rotor behavior than the
same relative change in any of the other terms. The FE results
for S22 showed that the conical beam model [3, 4] now found
in several modern rotordynamic programs consistently under-
estimates the flexibility of a conical section, for a wide range
of angles and wall thicknesses. Consider the plot in Fig. 4 (a),
which shows the ratio between the flexibilities of the analytical
beam model and the FE estimate. The effects of thickness have
been normalized by the average mid-plane radius, as defined
as Fig. 4(b), in order to render the curves nondimensional. As
can be seen, as the angle increases, or i\ decreases, the dis-
crepancy between the beam approximation and the FE result
increases. The data in this plot is used as the basis for an
empirical correction procedure outlined below. This represents
only a partial implementation of the hybrid element proposed
above, but it will be shown to provide significant improvements
nevertheless.
Modification Procedure
According to its analytical beam equation, S22 is inversely
proportional to the Young's modulus. Since it is very simple
to enter specific material values for given sections in most
rotordynamic program input files, it is proposed that a "con-
ical modulus" be implemented based on the results given in
Fig. 4. In this way, no modification to the source code of the
rotordynamic program need be performed, which is not the
case for the full hybrid element to be presented at a later date.
An engineer is only required to specify the taper angle a, in
radians, and ij, and determine an interpolated ratio from Fig.
4 in computing the appropriate modulus for the conical section
to be modeled. This interpolation is currently cast in the fol-
lowing form:
^CONICAL = E(\ .05 - 1.14a - 0A2r) + 1.08m? - 0.22a2 + 0.637/2
- 0.42a27) - 0.327y2a - 0.08a3 - 0.25i?3) (3)
where E is the nominal Young's modulus. Essentially, this
allows the engineer to "soften" the conical beam elements so
T = thickness (L)
d = angular rotation (radians)
V = shear load (MLT~2)
y = vertical deflection (L)
JULY 1990, Vol. 112/351
 Distribution of Rotation in Conical Section
100
c
o
~

"0 80
~
<; -& n = .60
"0 ..... n = .35
...o
Eo< 60
-0- n = .20

ClJ -o-n=.10
en
~

c 40
<J
...
U
<J
~
20 +--"'--,---'--r---'---.-~----,r-----'--"
o 20 40 60 80 100
Percentage of Total Length
Fig. 5 Distribution of flexibility in conical sections

(8)
that its flexibility, or stiffness, coincides with that indicated
in the parametric FE study.
It should be pointed out that although the conical modulus
is cast in nondimensional form, it is not truly applicable for
any general geometry because there is a length dependency,
typified by a third nondimensional variable, A, which is equal
to L/RM. The IO and 20 degree cases were computed using a
A value of 2.0, while the 30 and 40 degree cases used a value
of 1.0 for A. The discrepancy between the beam solution and
the FE result changes when A is varied, and thus it is recom-
mended that the conical modulus not be applied to sections
whose A values are much greater or less than the values used
in the FE study. In conical sections with very large values of
A, the majority of the rotation created by a bending moment
occurs at the small end, while the larger portion of the section
remains predominantly undeformed. Therefore, the overall
behavior of the conical section will- actually be governed by
the local value of A at the small end. To quantify this concept,
the percentage of the total rotation incurred by a bending
moment was computed for an example conical section of 20 (b)
degrees for several values of 1). The results are shown in Fig. Fig. 6(8) Static and (b) dynamic experiment setups
5. From this plot, it can be seen that for a wide range of 1)
values, a major portion of the rotation takes place in the first
IO percent of the length, and the majority of the flexibility is
concentrated in the first 20 percent, with the percentage de- this was not surprising in light of the FE results which also
creasing with larger wall thickness. This indicates that a proper indicated such an effect.
modeling technique would be to use short stations or elements Though accurate results were not obtained with the current
at the small end of a long tapered conical section since the static testing procedure, a qualitative verification was made of
overall behavior will be dominated by the local value of 1) a singular behavior of thin-walled conical sections. For an angle
there. of 40 degrees, membrane shell theory predicts that the off-
diagonal terms are negative, and this was verified in the FE
results. In an attempt to experimentally observe this, the 40
Experimental Correlations degree conical section shown was machined until its 1) value
With the goal of the correction method outlined being to was approximately 0.03 and then loaded with a shear load at
produce more accurate mass-elastic models, static and dynamic the end of the taper. Consistent with the FE results, the rotation
experiments were carried out. The static experiments were per- of the indicator rod was opposite in direction to that which
formed on representative 20 and 40 degree conical sections would be predicted using a beam analysis.
machined from flexible polycarbonate. Tensile testing of sam- The dynamic experiments were performed on a test shaft
ples of the plastic used showed that creep effects, which would containing two opposing 20 degree conical sections. The shaft
adversely affect any deflection measurements, were negligible was supported on foam as shown in Fig. 6(b). The shaft was
at room temperature. The static test setup is shown in Fig. created by machining two separate pieces and then carefully
6(a). An indicator rod was clamped at the end of the conical welding them together to ensure as uniform a joint as possible.
section and used to determine rotation values while a dial A large countersink was constructed and used to hollow each
caliper measured vertical deflections. Accurate measurements half so that a constant thickness geometry resulted. To study
proved very difficult to obtain using the setup shown. The the effects of varying wall thickness, material was successively
assumption that the rotation of the small conical face was removed by machining from each of the conical sections. A
equal to the rotation of the clamp attached to the indicator detailed study of the step geometries resulting from this ma-
rod proved to be unrealistic. Also assuming that the vertical chining process showed that their effects were much smaller
deflection of the bottom surface of the conical end was equal than the effect of the conical behavior, and thus they were
to the centerline deflection was quantitatively unreliable; and ignored.

352/ Vol. 112, JULY 1990 Transactions of the ASME

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 Testing was performed using a dual channel FFT analyzer
and impact methods. For structures with very low modal damp-
ing ratios and no significant nonlinear effects, impact testing
has been shown to be as accurate as sweep methods in natural
frequency measurement [5], and was adopted for simplicity.
Extremely clean and well defined transfer functions were ob-
tained, as expected, and no difficulties were experienced in
accurately assessing the natural frequencies. A state-of-the-art
rotordynamic program based upon the Myklestad-Prohl trans-
fer matrix method [6] was used which allows the computation
of nonrotating natural frequencies. For each rotordynamic
model, the discretization was increased until satisfactory con-
vergence in the computed frequencies was obtained, resulting
in typically 3 to 5 divisions in each conical section.
The comparison of the computed and measured frequencies
are presented in the following table. Typically, the conical
modulus was between 60 and 75 percent of the standard mod-
ulus. The thickness heading refers to the radial wall thickness
of the conical section; the wall thickness of the cylindrical
portions of the test shaft remained at 1/2 in. Note that no
"tuning" of the models was done, i.e., material properties
used in the cylindrical portions of the shaft were the standard
values, and were held constant throughout the correlation pro-
cedure. All frequencies are given in Hz (i.e., cycles per second).
As can be seen, a significant and consistent improvement is
seen in the prediction of the natural frequencies for all but the
fourth mode. The exact beam formulation consistently over-
estimates the stiffness of the conical section, and the subse-
quent overestimation in the frequency depends on how the
conical section is deformed in the particular mode. For the
fourth mode, the conical sections appeared at nodal locations,
indicating that the shear behavior is more important than the
bending behavior. In order to obtain a better indication of the
effect on the results of including the modified conical element,
consider the following plots. The percentage error, either po-
sitive or negative, is shown for each mode in Figs. 7-9, along
with the corresponding mode shapes and locations of the con-
ical sections.
Since the lower modes are characterized by simple in-phase
and out-of-phase rotation of the end cylinders on the more
flexible tapered sections, the conical bending behavior strongly
dictates the natural frequency. As shown, the inclusion of the
conical modulus decreases the error consistently, and corrects
the large errors seen in the exact beam model for the thin
walled geometries. The importance of the conical section in-
creases as its flexibility increases. Note that the mode shapes
shown were generated with the natural frequency program
Mode I Percent Error in Natural
Frequency: Mode I
I ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 - | 0 -| r , ,—
0 5 10 l'5 20 o 10
Length I / Wall Thickness
Mode 2 Percent Error in Natural
0.7 -. Frequency: Mode 2
Fig. 7 Mode shapes 1 & 2 and percent error in natural frequencies
using a 1/4 in. wall thickness, and are representative of the
mode shapes in general. As the wall thickness decreases, the
overestimation of the conical section stiffness by the beam
theory causes greater and greater error to occur. It is also
noteworthy to point out that the shaft was not completely
symmetric about a midpoint, thus the mode shapes are also
slightly nonuniform. The effect of using the modified element
in this way, and the step incurred by the removal of material,
becomes more important as higher modes are considered. As
the inertial forces increase, the error does not come from the
conical sections themselves as much as from the interfaces
between the conical sections and the remainder of the shaft.
For modes 3 and 4 it is seen that the conical modulus pro-
duces stiffness values which are generally lower than those
found in the actual shaft. From the mode shape plots, we see
that the large end of the cones are being bent more than the
smaller ends.The FE results for the 20 degree case produced
moduli which were similar to each other for the range of i\
values covered, typically 75-60 percent. These moduli pro-
duced improvements in the agreement for modes 1 and 2, in
which the outside ends, which are the smaller, were bent con-
siderably, while the larger ends were in straighter portions of

Measured Beam Model Error % Conical Model Error %

1040 1072.1 3.09 1043.8 0.37
1643 1693.6 3.04 1658.7 0.91
4042 4161.3 2.94 4123.0 2.00
5886 5970.0 1.43 5817.0 -1.17
7459 7943.0 6.50 7867.0 5.47
Measured Beam Model Error % Conical Model Error %
750 812.8 8.37 740.2 -1.31
1305 1430.8 9.64 1316.5 0.88
3900 3960.9 1.56 3871.0 -0.74
5225 5196.6 -0.56 4971.0 -4.86
7456 8000.8 7.31 7869.0 5.54
Measured Beam Model Error % Conical Model Error %
366 484.0 32.2 397.7 8.66
745 927.2 24.4 764.3 2.59
3343 3502.3 4.77 3300.7 -1.27
4418 4439.3 0.47 4140.2 -6.29
7675 8217.4 7.06 8034.9 4.68
Measured Beam Model Error % Conical Model Error %
229 310.3 35.5 245.3 7.12
530 666.2 25.7 528.6 0.26
2693 2822.7 4.80 2517.6 -6.51
3675 3685.8 0.30 3324.0 -9.55
7825 8323.0 6.36 8205.0 4.80

Journal of Vibration and Acoustics JULY 1990, Vol. 112/353

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 Percent E r r o r in Natural Mode 5 Percent E r r o r in Natural
Mode 3 Frequency: Mode 3 Frequency: Mode 5
1.0-
-a- Beam Model
Conical Modulus
Beam Model 0.5 -
Conical Modulus
•D
3 o.o-
E
< -0.5 -

-1.0-
5 10 15 0 10 20
Length I / Wall Thickness
Fig. 9 Mode shape 5 and percent error in natural frequency

term produces significant improvements when the geometry

of the conical section has a comparable X value as those used
•o- Beam Model in the finite element studies. By analyzing additional models
-«- Conical Modulus
with varying X values, the length dependency can be incor-
porated and thus closer agreement for modes such as 3 and 4
could be obtained, and the modification procedure would be
rendered completely nondimensional.
0 10 20
1 / Wall Thickness
Conclusions
Fig. 8 Mode shapes 3 & 4 and percent error in natural frequencies
A simple technique of modifying the analytical conical beam
element to coincide with the results of detailed finite element
the mode shapes. However, for modes 3 and 4, the larger ends models has been presented. Although the results of static ex-
are deformed more than the smaller ends. It can be concluded periments were only able to provide qualitative agreement,
then, that the conical moduli is appropriate for the elements dynamic experiments showed that the use of the technique
in the smaller end of the sections, while being too flexible for provides a significant improvement in the prediction of the
the larger ends. This echoes back to the problem of length natural frequencies for a nonrotating shaft containing two
dependency. The elements in the small end of the cones have opposed conical sections. The modification procedure is cast
X values typically around 1.5 or so, while the ones in the large in nondimensional form, but is shown to retain a length de-
end can be as small as 0.7; whereas the FE models were based pendency which could be removed with further analysis. This
on a value of 2.0 for X. It could be expected then, from these length dependency is shown to be at least one of the causes of
results, that were a set of FE models made with X values smaller the remaining discrepancy in comparisons between computed
than those used before, to more coincide with the large end and measured natural frequencies.
of the cones, the results would most likely be stiffer. Indeed
this is the case, as a check of such cases showed that a conical
section stiffened with respect to the exact beam solution as its References
X value was decreased and its TJ and a values were held constant. 1 Vance, J. M., Murphy, B. T., and Tripp, H. A., 1987, "Critical Speeds
Note that the effect of the step geometries, were they signif- of TurboMachinery: Computer Predictions vs. Experimental Measurements Part
icant, at the ends of the cones would be to decrease the fre- I: The Rotor Mass-Elastic Model," ASME JOURNAL OF VIBRATION, ACOUSTICS,
quencies. This further indicates that the conical moduli are too STRESS AND RELIABILITY IN DESIGN, Vol. 109, Jan., pp. 1-7.
2 Vest, T. A., and Darlow, M. S., 1988, "An Evaluation of Beam and Shell
low in the large ends of the conical sections. Effects for Hollow Conical Shafts," Proc. 6th Int. Modal Analysis Conf.,
Once mode 5 is reached, the shaft behavior has become truly Kissimmee, pp. 201-209.
3 Darlow, M. S., Murphy, B. T., Elder, J. A., and Sandor, G. N., 1980,
involved, and the effect of the conical section is but a small "Extension of the Transfer Matrix Method for Rotordynamic Analysis to Include
part of the total dynamic behavior. From the mode shape it a Direct Representation of Conical Sections and Trunnions," ASME Journal
is seen that the left conical section is being bent primarily in of Mechanical Design, Vol. 102, No. 1, Jan., pp. 122-129.
the small end and the right cone is for the most part in rigid 3 Darlow, M. S., Murphy, B. T., Elder, J. A., and Sandor, G. N., 1980,
body motion. Consistent with the results from the previous clude "Extension of the Transfer mAtrix Method for Rotordynamic Analysis to In-
a Direct Representation of Conical Sections and Trunnions," ASME
modes, we see that the softening effect of the conical modulus Journal of Mechanical Design, Vol. 102, No. 1, Jan., pp. 122-129.
provides a significant improvement in the natural frequency 4 Greenhill, L. M., Bickford, W. B., and Nelson, H. D., 1985, " A Conical
correlation, since it is the smaller portion of the cone which Beam Finite Element for Rotor Dynamics Analysis," ASME Journal of Vibra-
is being deformed most significantly. tion, Acoustic, Stress, and Reliability in Design.
5 Cawley, P., 1986, "The Accuracy of Frequency Response Function Meas-
It is recognized that the use of the modulus as a modification urements Using FFT-Based Analyzer with Transient Excitation," ASME Journal
procedure is certainly not a direct method, since, in fact, by of Vibration, Acoustics, Stress, and Reliability in Design, Vol. 108, Jan., pp.
changing its value, other terms in the flexibility matrix besides 44-49.
S22 are also altered. However, it has been demonstrated by of 6FlexibleProhl, M. A., 1945, " A General Method for Calculating Critical Speeds
Rotors," Vol. 67, ASME Journal of Applied Mechanics, Vol. 12,
these experimental correlations that the correction of the S22 pp. A142-A148.

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