Customer Reviews

Theory of Vibration with Applications (5th Edition)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

Very well written and updated, I especially like the way the authors have implemented MATLAB scripts in many of the more advanced matrix methods. BUT, do not use JUST this book, theory is unclear in many cases, and the proof to many of the equations (Vibrations is very math intensive) is brief, too brief in some cases. This book could easily be 200 pages longer. The main advantages of this book are that it covers many topics in advanced vibrations and over 500 end of chapter problems, many of them of higher difficulty. In short, if you already have some skills in Vibrations, this is a great book, but if you're using this text as an Intro to Vibrations, use as backup a friendlier book, such as Steidel's to get revved up. I used 3 sources for my course! By the way, I recommend Schaum's Outline for Mechanical Vibrations, many good examples there.

The reading is alright. The chapters are short but the examples are confusing, most of the steps are cut out leaving the reader to figure out what was done. I wouldn't recommend this book if someone is really trying to learn vibrations.

Dear fellow readers:
I borrowed this book from a friend, who used it in a university course. It was said that the examples used in this book were not sufficient enough to get the grasp of the concepts. I am sorry to say that this is not the only problem with this book. Although this is very complete book from concept to application point of view, the problem lies with the road the authors have taken to explain those theories. The topics are simply skimmed over and not much elaboration given to both development of the equations and application of those equations. As mentioned above the examples did not clarify my confusion any further. This left me confused and not as clear a picture as I hoped to gather. Perhaps this book is best suited as a reference for a person who is well versed in this topic and not a novice.

When I took this class I was utterly confused by most of the material and some of the problems made no sense whatsoever, neither the set up nor the solution. When I TA'ed the class, luckily the professor worked mainly out of a course erader made of his own notes. The bad part was he picked problems out of this book for homework. Many of the solutions are quite simple, WHEN YOU UNDERSTAND THE PROBLEM CORRECTLY, a task this book left completely up to me to explain to the students. Also, a few solutions were just plain wrong or required huge simplifications and assumptions that were not intuitive.
If you have to buy this book, buy the cheapest copy out there or just photocopy the few pages you'll need.
Also, where the h*ll do they get the nerve to charge so much for such a short useless book. It's a fifth edition that doesn't show much care or thought put into it.
This book is typical of what's wrong in the textbook publishing industry, we students are overcharged for garbage and required to buy the newest edition of content that hasn't changed in a hundred years. It's almost as if we're paying professors for plagiarizing classical theory!
I strongly recommend going elsewhere to LEARN the concepts of mechanical vibrations.

This is easily the poorest excuse for a textbook that I have ever had the misfortune of reading. The entire book reads as though a couple of first year grad students scrapped it together in the span of a week or two. The author picks the absolute simplest, most specific problems to use as examples, and skips most of the steps needed in the derivation. The homework problems are vague, don't give proper parameters, use different terms than those given in the reading, and sometimes the answer deck doesn't even have the right answer. If you are like me, and prefer to learn out of the book than pay close attention in lecture, then do not even bother with this book, find another one and photocopy the problems from a friend. Professors: do not torture your students with this book, its not worth the paper its printed on, much less the asking price.

The topics covered are many but the depth is zero and the examples are about 90% too short. It doesn't really help to get a picture and a solution without intermediate steps or even halfhearted explanation. This book is completely inaccessible to a student and will sit useless on the shelf as $130 bucks wasted. Disgusting.

This review is for the paperback fifth edition of this book.

Alright, I have read so many negative reviews of this book here. So even though this book was recommended elsewhere I was slightly apprehensive in buying it. I have read only the first 2 chapters, but I am so overwhelmed that I thought I will write a review.

My rating: excellent. This book will make you think and understand the subject. But it expects a certain level of mathematical and engineering maturity (not higher than undergraduate). The problem sets are excellent. When you sit and finish through the problems you really understand the topic. Lot of times I read the text twice and made sure that I understood the topic before starting the problems. But then I had to come back and refer again and surely I will figure out some missing information. It takes time but is very rewarding. Most of all this text doesn't assume that the readers are dumb - it expects that the readers can think.

What do I mean that the book expects a certain mathematical and engineering maturity? I will give a couple of examples. In the introductory chapter it has a small section on decomposition of periodic motion into Fourier series. There it expects for you to know how to integrate Integral(cos mx cos nx dx) or that Cos A cos B = 1/2[Cos(A+B) - cos(A-B)]. In second chapter to find the effective mass of a simply supported beam with a point load in the middle, it expects you to know
that the deflection of the beam can be written as y=y_max(3(x/l)-4(x/l)^3). I mean it will straight away write y=ymax... etc. No other intermediate steps. It will also just integrate this y_max(3(x/l)-4(x/l)^3) with respect to x and write the result as 0.4857 y_max or whatever value it is. It will expect that you know how to solve differential equation into characteristic equation and particular solution. It gives a proof for solving md^x/dt^2 + cdx/dt + kx = 0 but it is better for you to have some background in differential equation (again not more that undergraduate level) to fully understand it.

What do I mean that the book will make you think? For example when discussing energy methods on simple harmonic motion, it will say that due to conservation of energy T1+U1 = T2+U2 where 1 and 2 denotes two different positions of the vibrating body. By choosing 1 to be the static equilibrium position and choosing U1=0 as the reference potential energy, and 2 be the position corresponding to max disp, we have T1+0 = 0+U2. Now it says that if the system is undergoing harmonic motion then, T1 and U2 are max values and the preceding equation give rise to T_max = U_max. And that this equation will lead directly to natural frequency. It is up to you to figure out that for simple harmonic motion, x is given by x = A
sin(wt+phi), v = Aw cos(wt+phi), a = -Aw^2 sin(wt+phi). So when v = 0 it implies that cos (wt+phi) = 0 and that implies that sin(wt+phi) is +- 1 so x is max (also conversely). So T_max = 1/2*m*A*w^2 , since cos (wt+phi)=+-1. Also U_max = 1/2*k*A^2, since sin(wt+phi)= +-1. So T_max = U_max gives w^2 = k/m. (We are actually eliminating sin and cos terms by taking the max values).

In short, a very very good book for some one who has an undergraduate background in engineering and who is willing to think and put the effort. If you want a quick read or if you are looking for an easy book then this is probably not for you. But remember that you can only learn if you put the effort. There are a few typos for the answers at the back of the book, but that doesn't diminish the book's worth.

There are 3 typos I found in answers to odd problems at the back of the book. I have finished problems of only chapter 1.
Corrections for odd number answers at back:
-------------------------------------------
1.3) d^x/dt^2 _ max = 287.1 what is given is 278.1
1.11) x(t) = 1/2 + 4/pi^2( cos w1t + 1/3^2 cos 3w1t + 1/5^2 cos 5w1t + ...)
(what is given is sin w1t for the first harmonic term)
1.16) a_o = 2/3 (what is given is a_o = 1/3).

Again I may be wrong in the typos. Kindly double check them before using it.

It seems that those negative reviews follows the logic that difficult reading must be from terrible texts. The fallacy is obvious. This book is the most lucid structural dynamics texts I've read, and to me it's not second to Clough, though the latter covers more of earthquake engineering, the same as Chopra. Essentially, this book is for mechanical engineers with solid background of linear algebra and calculus. Sounds demanding? Maybe, but not the authors' fault.

I got this book because it was required for a class. If at all possible, stay away from this book.

This book likes to explain the basic algebraic steps while completely bypassing the important steps required to actually solve the problem. The text is written very poorly, it reads like a foreign written instruction manual, and the examples leave much to the imagination.

Avoid at all costs.

This book is what it says, a vibrations textbook that is basically designed to go with a college class. Not the best textbook in the world, but not too bad either. It gives a variety of topics in each chapter, but I personally wish it would address the topics more thoroughly instead of glazing over them. This is especially true with examples. For example, it would introduce a topic then give an example using polar or cylindrical coordinates, but wouldn't even cover some of the similar problems in other coordinate systems, which can be nice especially early on in the text. While it isn't completely necessary if your class covers enough examples, it helps if your going through a fast pace class which finishes these chapters in about 3 hours of class time at most. The chapters are really dense, so this is definitely not a textbook to just read lightly once. To all those who get this for a class, good luck.