Stress Waves in Solids

The theory of the propagation of waves in solids was developed during the 19th century but in the first quarter of this century it fell into neglect. Only recently as the result of new techniques of study and the development of new plastics and other such materials has it again become the object of intensive investigation. This book is the most readable survey of the theoretical core of current knowledge of the subject and unlike most other studies in the field it is fully correlated with experimental material.<br>The author who has taught applied physics on the college level for many years gives a concise account of the classical theory necessary to an understanding of the subject considers how this theory has been extended to solids which are not perfectly elastic and then summarizes the important experimental work of recent years. The first part Elastic Waves covers propagation in both an extended and a bounded plastic medium and experimental investigations with elastic materials. Included in this material are discussions of the components of stress and strain; Hooke's law; Rayleigh waves; reflection and refraction of elastic waves; vibrations of rods; the Pochhammer equation; propagation of an elastic pulse along cylindrical conical and non-circular bars; ultrasonic measurements; and other sub-topics. Part II Stress Waves in Imperfectly Elastic Media covers internal friction (definitions measurements mechanism etc.) experimental investigation of dynamic elastic properties (resonance and wave propagation methods dynamic stress-strain measurements etc.) plastic waves and shock waves (Lagrangian and Eulerian methods experiments shock waves in solids etc.) and fractures produced by stress waves (in conical and irregular specimens induced by explosives and by stress pulses brittle and ductile fractures etc.).<br>The appendix contains material on notations for stress; strain and elastic constants; vector form of wave equations; and curvilinear orthogonal coordinates. The text is completely corrected and the valuable material on waves in modern plastic substances is even more useful to physics students and engineers in the field than in earlier editions. A new bibliography of post-1953 literature is appended.