One proposed method to suppress vibrations of a mechanical structure is to couple the energy of vibration to an external electric shunt circuit. Coupling of the mechanical energy to the electric circuit is accomplished with a piezoelectric transducer attached to the structure. Significant amounts of mechanical energy can be dissipated by the shunt, but a large inductor is required. In this presentation, we describe an alternative approach that replaces the shunt with a linear passive electric circuit that is connected to another piezoelectric transducer attached to the structure. Even though the electric circuit does not contain an inductor, it is still possible to dissipate significant amounts of mechanical energy in the connecting circuit. The mechanism of energy dissipation in the electric circuit is similar to, but not identical to, that exploited by a tuned electric shunt. Inductance, however, is provided by mutual coupling of piezoelectric transducers on the structure.
The development of a new class of passive vibration and acoustic suppression systems is presented. The approach is to transfer the energy from one mechanical system to another using reversible piezoelectric transducers connected with a passive electric circuit. Response of the first system is suppressed while exciting the response of the second system. The two mechanical systems can be physically separated structures, or different mechanical modes of a single structure. The passive electric circuit is a network containing diodes and/or transistors switched from the piezoelectric voltages. Reductions of 25% in the response of the directly excited system have been shown. This approach is an improvement over a passive shunt technique in that the typically heavy inductor in the electrical shunt is replaced with an existing system mechanical impedance. It also has the advantage over active control techniques in that an external power source is not required and there is no possibility to add energy to the system from the controller.
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