Passive vibration suppression using nonlinear electromechanical coupling

Abstract

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.