Monday  |  Salon 14  |  04:20 PM–04:40 PM

#18668–Reciprocity-Breaking Suspension Devices for Isolation in Harsh Environments

This research focuses on the creation of novel suspension devices for use in dynamically isolating sensitive equipment and/or passengers in vehicles subjected to harsh environments. The proposed approach is to employ asymmetry and nonlinearity in the suspension to break dynamic reciprocity, which results in a unidirectional transfer of energy and isolates an interior cabin from the exterior. The design is inspired by metamaterials that exhibit dynamic isolation using kinematic linkages in the form of a honeycomb structure. This study focuses on honeycomb-type structures with asymmetry that are designed and optimized to allow net zero force transfer. This modified structure is incorporated with lumped mass models to realize the reciprocity breaking suspension device. The study is performed on a lumped–parameter system model with parametric variations and numerical simulations, allowing us to determine the combinations of non–linearities for optimizing the input forces, output responses, and isolation performance. The isolation performance is determined by tracking the mechanical energy as it flows through the suspension system and the displacement amplitudes of all components in the suspension. The potential applications can be extended to isolation of sensitive equipment subjected to extreme loading, such as commercial vehicles to next generation aero structures.

Sayantan Ghosh   Georgia Institute of Technology
Emma Soukup   University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Keegan Moore   Georgia Institute of Technology