Frequency domain analysis of pre-stressed elastomeric vibration isolators

Two types of elastomeric vibration isolators used for equipment vibration isolation in aerospace vehicles are considered for the present study. These isolators are constructed using elastomers mounted in steel encasings. These isolators are initially deformed statically and dynamic loads are applied on the deformed configuration. To capture the static deformation, equivalent static load corresponding to its load rating and specified displacements are created. Static deformation is computed using Finite Element methods with four node axi-symmetric element which include the geometric non-linear effect for steel and with standard Yeoh hyper-elastic material model for elastomers(Muhammed and Zu, 2012) [1]. Yeoh material constants are derived from uni-axial tension test data of the elastomer specimen. These isolators are subjected to harmonic and random excitations in the pre-deformed state. For numerical analysis, elastomeric constants at dynamic conditions are obtained as complex function of frequency using Dynamic Mechanical Analyzer(DMA) for a range of frequencies. The standard material model of Yeoh is modified incorporating frequency dependant material characteristics and damping in the range of frequencies of interest. A multiplicative non-separable variables law is derived for Yeoh material model to include the effect of static pre-stress, based on the methodology given in literature(Nashif et al.,1985;Beda et al., 2014) [2,3]. The modifications of Yeoh model suitable for frequency domain analysis is the novelty in the present study. In the analysis, while dynamic loads are applied, the configuration is updated considering initial static loading. The frequency response of the isolators is computed using material properties evaluated at progressive dynamic strains until a match in natural frequency is observed. Appropriate damping corrections are then incorporated to match the test observed transmissibility. Then updated material properties are used to compute the random response which showed good agreement with results of experiments, validating the approach taken for the development of this model.

In-plane and out-of-plane quasi-static compression performance enhancement of 3D printed re-entrant diamond auxetic metamaterial with geometrical tuning and fiber reinforcement

Auxetic materials are cellular materials with a unique property of negative Poisson’s ratio.The auxeticity and performance of these metamaterials utterly depend on the geometrical parameters and loading direction.For the first time,the quasi-static uniaxial compression performance of fused filament fabricated re-entrant diamond auxetic metamaterial is evaluated in the x-direction(in-plane)and z-direction(out-of-plane).The most commonly used thermoplastic feedstock,Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene,is considered a material of choice.The effect of influential geometrical parameters of the re-entrant diamond structure and printing parameter is systematically studied using Taguchi’s design of experiments.Grey-based multi-objective optimisation technique has been adopted to arrive at the optimal structure.Efforts are made to improve the stiffness and strength of the structure with fibre reinforcements.Micro glass fibre reinforcements have enhanced specific strength and stiffness in both in-plane and out-ofplane directions.A sevenfold and thirteen times increase in specific strength and energy absorption is evident for glass fibre-reinforced structures in out-of-plane directions compared to in-plane ones.Proper tuning of geometrical parameters of the re-entrant diamond structure can result in a Poisson’s ratio of up to-3.49 when tested in the x-direction.The parametric study has illustrated the tailorability of the structure according to the application requirements.The statistical study has signified each considered parameter’s contribution to the compression performance characteristics of the 3D printed re-entrant diamond auxetic metamaterial.

Identification of crack in a structural member using improved radial basis function(IRBF)neural networks

Purpose–The purpose of this paper is to provide an effective and simple technique to structural damage identification,particularly to identify a crack in a structure.Artificial neural networks approach is an alternative to identify the extent and location of the damage over the classical methods.Radial basis function(RBF)networks are good at function mapping and generalization ability among the various neural network approaches.RBF neural networks are chosen for the present study of crack identification.Design/methodology/approach–Analyzing the vibration response of a structure is an effective way to monitor its health and even to detect the damage.A novel two-stage improved radial basis function(IRBF)neural network methodology with conventional RBF in the first stage and a reduced search space moving technique in the second stage is proposed to identify the crack in a cantilever beam structure in the frequency domain.Latin hypercube sampling(LHS)technique is used in both stages to sample the frequency modal patterns to train the proposed network.Study is also conducted with and without addition of 5%white noise to the input patterns to simulate the experimental errors.Findings–The results show a significant improvement in identifying the location and magnitude of a crack by the proposed IRBF method,in comparison with conventional RBF method and other classical methods.In case of crack location in a beam,the average identification error over 12 test cases was 0.69 per cent by IRBF network compared to 4.88 per cent by conventional RBF.Similar improvements are reported when compared to hybrid CPN BPN networks.It also requires much less computational effort as compared to other hybrid neural network approaches and classical methods.Originality/value–The proposed novel IRBF crack identification technique is unique in originality and not reported elsewhere.It can identify the crack location and crack depth with very good accuracy,less computational effort and ease of implementation.