Laplace transform techniques greatly simplify many problems in linear viscoelasticity. However, if realistic material property representations are used, inversion of the resulting transforms can be difficult. Although approximate transform inversion methods have been widely used in quasi-static viscoelastic problems, the application of these techniques to wave propagation problems has been less successful. Inaccuracy of the transform inversion has been noted previously in the literature. The present work shows that one of the numerical Laplace transform inversion techniques of Bellman can successfully be applied to dynamic viscoelasticity. Comparisons with literature solutions and exact functions indicate accuracies to within ±1 percent can be obtained.
