Performance characteristics of a vibration isolator with electro-rheological fluids

Abstract

The conflicting requirements on the damping capacity if a vibration isolator in the low- and high-frequency regimes can be achieved by actively controlling a damper with electro-rheological fluid. Experimentally obtained results on two colloidal suspensions, one based on silica powder and the other on starch powder, are reported. While both demonstrate considerable reduction in the near-resonance transmissibility, the starch based fluid exhibits Coulomb damping characteristics at a high field strength. This, in turn, restricts the transmissibility to less than or equal to unity at all frequencies even when the isolator is used in a passive manner.