Abstract
The effect of viscous damping on stability of beam resting on an elastic foundation subjected to a dry friction force is analytically studied. The beam resting on an elastic foundation subjected to dry friction force is modeled for simplicity into a beam resting on Kelvin-Voigt type foundation subjected to distributed follower load. In particular, the effects of four boundary conditions (clamped-free, clamped-pinned, pinned-pinned, clamped-clamped) on the system stability are considered. The critical value and instability type of columns on the elastic foundation subjected to a distributed follower load is investigated by means of finite element method for four boundary conditions. The elastic foundation modulus, viscous damping coefficient and boundary conditions affect greatly both the instability type and critical load. Also, the increase of damping coefficient raises the critical flutter load (stabilizing effect) but reduces the critical divergence load (destabilizing effect).