An Unusual Damped Stability Property and its Remedy for an Integration Method

An unusual stability property is found for a structure-dependent integration method since it exhibits a different nonlinearity interval of unconditional stability for zero and nonzero damping. Although it is unconditionally stable for the systems of stiffness softening and invariant as well as most systems of stiffness hardening, an unstable solution that is unexpected is obtained as it is applied to solve damped stiffness hardening systems. It is found herein that a nonlinearity interval of unconditional stability for a structure-dependent method may be drastically shrunk for nonzero damping when compared to zero damping. In fact, it will become conditionally stable for any damped stiffness hardening systems. This might significantly restrict its applications. An effective scheme is proposed to surmount this difficulty by introducing a stability factor into the structure-dependent coefficients of the integration method. This factor can effectively amplify the nonlinearity intervals of unconditional stability for structure-dependent methods. A large stability factor will result in a large nonlinearity interval of unconditional stability. However, it also introduces more period distortion. Consequently, a stability factor must be appropriately selected for accurate integration. After choosing a proper stability factor, a structure-dependent method can be widely and easily applied to solve general structural dynamic problems.