Cross-Well Actuation of Bistable Structures Subjected to Noise Disturbance

Large loads due to fluid-structure interaction can lead to high bending stresses and fatigue failure in wings and wind turbine blades. A solution for the mentioned problem is using a bistable composite laminate for load alleviation. A bistable composite laminate is capable of attaining two statically stable shapes, and it can be designed to alleviate a critical load, such as wind gust, by snapping from one stable position to the other. Piezocomposite actuators can be used to reverse the snap-through and bring back the structure to its original optimal aerodynamic shape, after the gust load is alleviated. However, there will always be a limit on the size of the piezocomposite actuator used; hence, severe force and energy constraints exist to achieve the snap-through. In this context, this paper focuses on the minimum required actuation energy for performing snap-through of a bistable structure. The paper shows how the required energy for cross-well transfer varies as a function of damping ratio and frequency ratio at specific harmonic force amplitude when the system is externally disturbed with a band-limited noise signal. A band-limited noise signal is chosen to model external/ambient disturbances. This paper uses the Duffing-Holmes equation as a one-degree-of-freedom representative model of a bistable structure. This equation is numerically solved to calculate the required energy for cross-well oscillation under different system and forcing conditions. Various non-dimensional parameters are used to highlight interesting phenomena. It is found that the domain of low energy regions decreases by increasing the level of noise.