Experimental and Numerical Investigation of Vibration Damping Using a Thin Layer Coating

High cycle fatigue (HCF) is the main cause of failure in rotating machinery especially in aircraft engines which results in the loss of human life as well as billions of dollars. More than 60 percent of aircraft accidents are related to High cycle fatigue. Major reason for HCF is vibratory stresses induced in the blades at resonance. Damping is needed to avoid vibratory stresses to reach the failure level. High speed rotating machinery has to pass through the resonance in order to reach the operational speed and chances of failure are high at resonance level. It is therefore required to suppress the vibrations at resonance level to avoid any damage to the structure. Application of coating to suppress vibrations is a current area of research. Various types of coatings have been studied recently. This includes plasma graded coatings, viscoelastic dampers, piezoelectric material damping, and magnetomechanical damping. In this research, the phenomenon of damping using a coating of nickel alloy on a steel beam is studied experimentally and numerically to reduce vibratory stresses by enhancing damping characteristics to avoid aircraft engine and rotating machinery failure. For this purpose, uncoated and nickel alloy coated steel beams are fabricated. The coating procedure was performed using plasma arc method. The beams were then mounted in a cantilevered position and bump and vibration shaker tests were conducted to determine the natural frequencies and mode shapes. One of the most important parameter to measure the damping of a system is the damping ratio. In order to determine the damping ratio, vibration analyzer mode was adjusted in time domain and beam was excited by using a hammer. The vibration analyzer showed the vibration decay as a function of time. Using that decay, damping ratio was calculated by using logarithmic decrement method. In order to investigate and compare the damping characteristics of un-coated and coated beams, forced response method was employed. In this method, beams were excited at 1st and 2nd bending mode natural frequencies using vibration shaker. Results were very encouraging and showed a significant improvement in damping characteristics. The experimental results were then endorsed by numerical results which were achieved by performing modal and forced response analysis using finite element analysis techniques.