Irregular vibrations in multi-mass discrete-continuous systems torsionally deformed

in the paper irregular vibrations of discrete-continuous systems consisting of an arbitrary number rigid bodies connected by shafts torsionally deformed are studied. in the systems a local nonlinearity described by the polynomial of the third degree is introduced. it is assumed that the characteristic of the local nonlinearity is of a hard type. governing equations are solved using the wave approach leading to equations with a retarded argument. exemplary numerical calculations are done for the three-mass system. the possibility of occurring of irregular vibrations is discussed on the basis of the poincaré maps, bifurcations diagrams and the exponents of lyapunov.