Vibration of Simple Mechanical Systems

Objective
By the end of this lab, students should be able to
- analyze simple mechanical systems,
- do the necessary approximations to convert real-life continuous systems into simple lumped ones, and
- quantify the system parameters.
Introduction
The aim of this experiment is to investigate the transmissibility of a coil spring vibration isolators. The isolator is fitted
to a shaker. The shaker provides excitation over a broad range of frequencies and the acceleration at the top and the
bottom of the mount are compared. Figure 1 shows the setup and a schematic of the mechanical system. The vibrating
mass (m) is squeezed between two compression springs of the same dimensions. Those springs are sitting on two light
seats that are rigidly mounted to the table of an electromagnetic shaker through an M4 threaded rod. Two
accelerometers a1 and a2 are waxed to the top seat and the mass m, respectively.
The investigation is done in two steps:
1. Measurement of the transmissibility.
2. Calculation of the transmissibility.

Acc. (a1)
Top seat
Locking nut
Top spring
Acc. (a2)
Mass (m)

Threaded rod
Bottom spring
Bottom seat
Shaker base

Figure 1. Set up for transmissibility measurement. (Left: Schematic Right: Photo)

Useful Data
The vibrating mass is made of low carbon steel. The portion with the large diameter is
shoulders are

17 7 mm.

The through hole is

5 mm.

39 20 mm, while the two

The mean diameter of the springs D is 19 mm with 6.5

effective turns. They are made of spring steel ( G = 80 GPa) wires with diameter d = 0.1 inch.

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Procedures for the measurement:

1. Open MATLAB, and make sure that the settings of the switch box is set to the following:
Output 1 is connected to input 2, and output 2 is connected to input 4.
2.

In order to check the system, run a ready made program to read the data online
read_data

3.

Wait until the lab assistant tells you to start recording right before starting.

4.

Define the following parameters

sf = 1024;
st = 5;
ns = st*sf;
nav = 5;
nfftl = 20000;
xyav = zeros(nfftl/2+1,1);

5.

% sampling frequency
% sampling time
% number of samples
% number of averages
% number of fft lines
% initialize TF for(x/y) average

Capture data for (nav) times

figure(1);
% open figure 1
for i = 1:nav
a = WAVRECORD(ns,sf,2);
% record data
[xy,f] = tfestimate(a(:,1),a(:,2),[],[],nfftl,sf);
%calculate TF
xyav = (xyav*(i-1)+xy)/i;
% average with previous data
subplot(2,1,1); cla;
% top half: clear axis
semilogx(f,20*log10(abs(xyav)));% plot abs(TF)
axis([20,500,-50,20]); grid on; % select axes lims; turn grid on
subplot(2,1,2); cla;
% bottom half: clear axis
semilogx(f,180/pi*(angle(xyav)));
% plot phase
axis([20,500,-180,180]); grid on;% select axes lims; turn grid on
xlabel('Frequency - Hz'); ylabel('Phase^o');
% label axes
end

Procedure for the calculation:

1. Calculate the mass m. [0.206 kg]
2. Calculate the stiffness (k) of each spring using

k=
3.

Gd 4
[9336 N/m]
8D 3 N e

As a first approximation, neglect the mass of the springs and choose from Figure 3 either (a), (b), or (c) as a
suitable lumped system representation.
m/2
m
k
m
k

m/2
k

(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 3. Possible lumped system representation.

4.

Calculate the natural frequency

n , f n

of the approximate system. [ f n = 48 Hz]

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5.

Assume the displacement of m is x(t) and that of the shaker is y(t).

Start by the equation of motion
m&x& = c( x& y& ) 2k ( x y)
to show that the transfer function x / y for a harmonic excitation of y is given by:
x
=
y

(2k )2 + (2fc )2
(2k (2f )2 m )2 + (2fc )2

where c is the damping coefficient.

6.

Plot on a semi-log scale the frequency response ( f ,20 log x / y ) for the approximate system taking
c / 2m n = 0.12 .

k = 9336;
m = 0.206; zeta = 0.12;
wn = sqrt(2*k/m); c = 2*m*wn*zeta;
f = 0:1:1000;
w = 2*pi*f;
xy =

% system parameters
% nat freq and damping coef.
% frequencies

% Write a MATLAB command that calculates the transmissibility (TR)

%described by the above equation using the following hints:
%a) The square root in MATLAB is done using: sqrt
%b) Take care of the order of the brackets
%c) To multiply or divide two vectors of the same length, write: u.*v
figure(1); subplot(2,1,1); hold on;
% use same figure
semilogx(f,20*log10(abs(xy)),r,'LineWidth',2); % plot theor. trans.
7.

Compare this to the one you experimentally measured in the lab. Write down your comments on the
success/failure of the proposed model to predict the response of the real system.

Report
1. In your report, write your MATLAB code and put your plots and include all calculations.
2. Derive the expression for transmissibility starting from the equation of motion. (Item 5 in calculation
procedure)
3. Comment on the transmissibility curve in general. In which region is the damping most effective?
4. Comment on the difference between the measured and calculated transmissibility.
5. In our modeling, we have assumed a single degree of freedom system. For which frequency range is this
assumption valid?
6. What can we do to make the simulation better?

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