Study of Cycloidal Pendulum Dynamic Absorber for Vibration Control of Structures

The dynamic absorber has been widely used for suppressing vibration in structures. In practical application, the optimal tuned absorbers are designed and used in terms of natural frequency and additional damping so that resultant frequency response may become fully reduced. Among various types of dynamic absorber, the pendulum type is preferable due to its simple constitution and performance reliability. However, damping performance of ordinal pendulum system may be influenced by levels of excitation because of intrinsic nonlinearity in system which leads to slight change in natural frequency. The present paper deals with a study of new type pendulum dynamic absorber. It is known that pendulum moving along cycloidal curve strictly keeps uniform period. Both analytical and experimental investigations show that a strict optimal damping condition can be satisfied in cycloidal pendulum damper, in conjunction with better damping performance compared with normal pendulum.