Thesis (M. S.)--Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008. / Committee Chair: Singhose, William; Committee Member: Book, Wayne; Committee Member: Ferri, Aldo.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2007. / William Singhose, Committee Chair ; Steven Danyluk, Committee Member ; Donna Llewellyn, Committee Member ; Nader Sadegh, Committee Member ; Neil Singer, Committee Member.

Piezoelectric-based energy harvesting devices provide an attractive approach to powering remote devices as ambient mechanical energy from vibrations is converted to electrical energy. These devices have numerous potential applications, including actuation, sensing, structural health monitoring, and vibration control -- the latter of which is of particular interest here. This work seeks to develop an understanding of energy harvesting behavior within the framework of a semi-active technique for reducing turbomachinery blade vibrations, namely resonance frequency detuning. In contrast with the bulk of energy harvesting research, this effort is not focused on maximizing the power output of the system, but rather providing the low power levels required by resonance frequency detuning. The demands of this technique dictate that harvesting conditions will be far from optimal, requiring that many common assumptions in conventional energy harvesting research be relaxed. Resonance frequency detuning has been proposed as a result of recent advances in turbomachinery blade design that have, while improving their overall efficiency, led to significantly reduced damping and thus large vibratory stresses. This technique uses piezoelectric materials to control the stiffness, and thus resonance frequency, of a blade as the excitation frequency sweeps through resonance. By detuning a structure*s resonance frequency from that of the excitation, the overall peak response can be reduced, delaying high cycle fatigue and extending the lifetime of a blade. Additional benefits include reduced weight, drag, and noise levels as reduced vibratory stresses allow for increasingly light blade construction. As resonance frequency detuning is most effective when the stiffness states are well separated, it is necessary to harvested at nominally open- and short-circuit states, corresponding to the largest separation in stiffness states. This presents a problem from a harvesting standpoint however, as open- and short-circuit correspond to zero charge displacement and zero voltage, respectively, and thus there is no energy flow. It is, then, desirable to operate as near these conditions as possible while still harvesting sufficient energy to provide the power for state-switching. In this research a metric is developed to study the relationship between harvested power and structural stiffness, and a key result is that appreciable energy can be harvested far from the usual optimal conditions in a typical energy harvesting approach. Indeed, sufficient energy is available to power the on-blade control while essentially maintaining the desired stiffness states for detuning. Furthermore, it is shown that the optimal switch in the control law for resonance frequency detuning may be triggered by a threshold harvested power, requiring minimal on-blade processing. This is an attractive idea for implementing a vibration control system on-blade, as size limitations encourage removing the need for additional sensing and signal processing hardware.

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L’allègement des structures imposé par les réductions de coût se traduit par des structures de plus en plus souples qui les rendent de plus en plus sensibles aux vibrations. Le contrôle des vibrations devient donc un enjeu majeur dans de nombreuses applications industrielles et les limites des matériaux imposent maintenant un recours au contrôle actif de plus en plus fréquent. L’évolution des structures au cours du temps (viellisement, conditions aux limites, architecture, …) pose le problème de la robustesse du contrôle. Par ailleurs, l’actionnement de plus en plus présent dans le domaine mécanique constitue à la fois une source supplémentaire de vibrations, mais aussi de contrôle et d’évolution d’architecture des structures. La thèse s’intéresse au contrôle actif autoadaptatif des vibrations permettant de maintenir automatiquement la performance et la stabilité des structures évolutives. Il s’agit donc de s’affranchir de la connaissance des causes et des informations sur les évolutions. La méthode proposée s’appuie sur un développement modal permettant de limiter le nombre de composants de contrôle et de cibler les modes à contrôler en limitant l’énergie de contrôle. Ainsi, il est nécessaire de reconstruire les caractéristiques du modèle modal indispensables pour réactualiser le contrôle en figeant seulement une structure de modèle. S’affranchissant à la fois des causes d’évolution de la structure et utilisant seulement une structure de modèle, la méthode est généralisable à toute application en mécanique des structures. La méthode proposée, basée sur l’utilisation d’un identificateur exploitant à la fois excitation et réponse de la structure, prend en compte les limites imposées par le contrôleur. Le modèle constitue le lien qui doit être établi entre identificateur et contrôle pour permettre la réactualisation. Par ailleurs, un compromis entre l’objectif d’atténuation des vibrations et les performances de l’identification est alors nécessaire du fait du couplage identification/contrôle apparaissant dans la boucle fermée. Ce compromis est également conditionné par le matériel utilisé. La méthode proposée est exploitée sur une structure discrète mettant en évidence une inversion de formes modales au cours de son évolution qui déstabilise un contrôle figé. Le choix opéré pour répondre aux différents compromis cités ci dessus a conduit à l’utilisation d’un contrôleur classique (LQG) et un identificateur basé sur la méthode des sous-espaces (N4SID). Cette application sur une structure simple a permis de caractériser un certain nombre de limites physiques : la bande passante, densité modale, vitesse d’évolution, Le contrôle modal autoadaptatif proposé s’avère robuste en performance et efficace lorsque la réactualisation est systématique. Une variante conditionnelle, toujours basée sur l’analyse de la réponse de la structure, est enfin proposée pour optimiser le processus de réactualisation afin de suivre plus efficacement les évolutions. / The lightness of structure due to the reduction of cost results in some structures which are more and more flexible. This flexibility makes these structures more sensitive to vibrations. The vibration control becomes an important issue in lots of industrial applications, and now the limitation of materials imposes a requirement of active control more and more frequently.The change of time-varying structure(ageing effect, boundaries conditions, architecture of structure etc)brings the robust problem of control.Further more,the action of device which emerges more and more frequently in mechanical fields introduces not only an additional cause of vibrations,but also a source of control and a source for changing the architecture of structures.The thesis focuses on self-adaptive active control of vibration which permits to keep up automatically the performance and stability of the time-varying structures.So it needs to overcome the knowing about cause and information on the changes.The proposed method relies on a development of modal technology which permits to limit the amount of component in control system and to target on the modes which need to be controlled.So the energy of control is limited. Further more,it needs to reconstruct the characteristics of modal model which are indispensable for updating the control.In this case, only the structure of model is fixed.Overcoming the knowing about cause of change in the structure and using only the structure of model, this method can be generalized for all applications in mechanical structures.The proposed method is based on the utilization of an identifier which uses both the excitation and response of the structure.And this method considers the limitations induced by the controller.The model forms le link which should be established between the identifier and the controller for allowing the updating. Further more, a compromise between the objective of reducing vibrations and the performance of identification is necessary due to the coupling effect of identification/control which appears in the closed-loop. This compromise is also conditioned by the used equipments.The proposed method is carried out on a discrete time-varying structure for showing an inversion of mode shape during its change. This inversion of mode shape destabilises a fixed control system. The operated choices for responding the different previous quoted compromise lead to a classic controller (LQG) and an identifier based on the subspace method (N4SID).This application on a simple structure permitted to characterise some physical limitation: the bandwidth, the modal density and the velocity of change…The proposed self-adaptive modal control is proved to be robust in terms of performance and be efficient when the updating is systematical. Always based on the analysis of the response of the structure, a conditional variant is finally proposed for optimizing the process of updating in order to follow the change more efficiently.