Numerical analysis of elastomer buffer embedded in the suspension of automobile for vibration damping improvement

Year 2018, , 65 - 75, 03.04.2018

Ahmad Partovi Meran

https://doi.org/10.18245/ijaet.438049

Abstract

Elastomers, due to their excellent damping and energy absorption characteristics and low cost are used extensively in automobile industry to isolate the structures from vibration and shock loads. In this study, it was aimed to analyze the damping performance of an elastomer buffer embedded in the suspension of an automobile. To reach to this aim, vibration simulation of an automobile suspension model was conducted by using a nonlinear explicit finite element code, Abaqus. In order to simulate the damping behavior of elastomer buffer, the hyperelastic and linear viscoelastic material models were used together. The numerical model was validated with results of exact solution method in terms of transmissibility ratio and phase shift in a wide range of input excitation frequencies. Good agreement was observed between the exact solution and finite element results, which indicate that finite element model is sufficiently accurate. To examine the damping performance of the buffer, the displacement time history curves were extracted for suspension with and without buffer under the sinusoidal base excitation. The vibrating motions of suspension for both conditions were compared. The comparison results proved that the elastomer buffer was effective in improvement of damping performance of suspension. It reduced the amplitude of vibration and oscillation time of sprung mass remarkable in excitation frequencies around and over the natural frequency of the system.

Keywords

Elastomer, Viscoelasticity, Suspension, Buffer, viscoelastic damping

References

• - Lakes, R. Viscoelastic Materials. New York, United States of America, cambridge university press,(2009).
• - Jones, D. I. G. Handbook of Viscoelastic Vibration Damping. West Sussex, England: John Wiley and Sons, LTD, (2001).
• - Luo, R. K., Wang, W., Xu, Q.and X. Li, An energy dissipation approach on complete loading-unloading and dynamic impact predictions with experimental verification for rubber anti-vibration component. Polymer Testing 63 (2017) 314-322.
• - Ucar, H. and Basdogan, I. Dynamic characterization and modeling of rubber shock absorbers: A comprehensive case study Journal of Low Frequency Noise, Vibration and Active Control (2017) DOI: 10.1177/1461348417725954
• - Vriend, N.M. and Kren, A.P. Determination of the viscoelastic properties of elastomeric materials by the dynamic indentation method. Polym Test (2004); 23: 369–375.
• - Lin, T.R., Farag, N.H. and Pan, J. Evaluation of frequency dependent rubber mount stiffness and damping by impact test. Appl Acoust (2005); 66: 829–844.
• - Haupt, P. and Sedlan, K. Viscoplasticity of elastomeric materials: experimental facts and constitutive modelling. Arch Appl Mech (2001); 71: 89–109.
• - Busfield, J.J.C., Deeprasertkul, C. and Thomas, A.G. Effect of liquids on the dynamic properties of carbon black filled natural rubber as a function of pre-strain. Polymer (2000), 41(26). pp 9219-9225.
• - Pacheco J.E.L., Bavastri, C.A. and Pereira, J.T. Viscoelastic relaxation modulus characterization using prony series. Latin Am J Solids Struct (2015); 12: 420–445.
• - Rao, M.D. Recent applications of viscoelastic damping for noise control in automobiles and commercial airplanes journal of sound and vibration. 262(2003) 457-474.
• - Mallik, A. K., Kher, V., Puri, M. Hatwal, H. On the modeling of non-linear elastomeric vibration isolators, Journal of Sound and Vibration. 219 (1999) 239-253.
• - Richards, C.M. and Singh, R. Characterization of rubber isolator nonlinearities in the context of single- and multi-degree-of-freedom experimental systems, Journal of Sound and Vibration, (2001) 247(5), 807-834.
• - Chandra. N. C., Hatwal, H. and Mallik, A.K. Response of Non-linear Dissipative Shock Isolators. Journal of Sound and Vibration, (1998 ), 214 (4) : 589-603.
• - Shaska, K., Ibrahim, R. A. and Gibson, R. F. Influence of excitation amplitude on the characteristics of nonlinear butyl rubber isolators. Nonlinear Dynamics, (2007), 47 (1-3) :83-104.
• - Sjoberg, M. and Kari, L. Testing of Nonlinear Interaction Effects of Sinusoidal and Noise Excitation on Rubber Isolator Stiffness. Polymer Testing, (2003), 22 (3) : 343-351.
• - Banic, M.S., Stamenkovic, D.S., Miltenovic, V.D., Milosevi, M.S., Miltenovi, A.V., Djeki, P.S., Rackov, M.J. Prediction of Heat Generation in Rubber or Rubber-metal Springs. Therm. Sci. (2012), 16, 527–539.
• - Huang, B. W., Tseng, J. G. and Ko, Y.L. Stress and vibration of a viscoelastic damping isolator under impact loading. Journal of Vibro engineering, (2014)vol. 16, no. 5, pp. 2355–2362.
• - Johnson, A.R.; Chen, T.K. Approximating Thermo-viscoelastic Heating of Largely Strained Solid Rubber Components. Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Engrg. (2005), 194, 313–325.
• - Luo, R.K. Gabbitas, B.L. and Brickle, B.V. Fatigue design in railway vehicle bogies based on dynamic simulation Veh. Syst. Dyn., 25 (1996), pp. 438-449.
• - Luo, R.K., Gabbitas, B.L. and Brickle B.V. Fatigue life evaluation of a railway vehicle bogie using an integrated dynamic simulation J. Rail Rapid Transit, 208 (1994), pp. 123-132.
• - Grassie S.L. Resilient railpads their dynamic behaviour in the laboratory and on track Proc. Inst. Mech. Eng., 203 (2007), pp. 25-32.
• - http://www.buykorea.org/product-details/Power-cushion-buffer--54339.html
• - ABAQUS User’s Manual Ver. 6.10 Dausault Systems Inc., 2010.
• - Nandi, B., Dalrymple, T., Yao, J. and Lapzyk, I. Importance of capturing non-linear viscoelastic material behavior in tire rolling simulations, (2014) meeting of the tire society.