A New Metamaterial Magnetorheological Elastomer Isolator with Tunable Vibration Bandgaps
Abstract
Semi-active isolators working with laminated magnetorheological elastomer (MRE) structures have attracted considerable interests in the area of vibration suppression. This work reports the development of a new metamaterial based MRE isolator with enhanced performance suitable for wide frequency ranges, which takes advantage of tunable vibration bandgaps due to the introduction of novel metamaterial structures. Specifically, a metamaterial MRE isolator was designed and prototyped. The mechanism of the formation of vibration bandgaps, for both infinite and finite periodic structures, was theoretically analysed, which details the equivalent negative stiffness of the metamaterial MRE isolator. Experiments were conducted to evaluate bandgaps of the metamaterial MRE isolator and its vibration isolation capacity. Results demonstrate that the new metamaterial MRE isolator is cable of offering enhanced vibration isolation performance with controllable bandgaps. Further research is recommended.
Brief Bio of Weihua Li
Dr Weihua Li is a Senior Professor and Director of Advanced Manufacturing Technologies Power House at the University of Wollongong. He completed his PhD at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in 2001. He worked as a Research Fellow at the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering of NTU, before he joined the School of Mechanical, Materials and Mechatronic Engineering as a Lecturer in 2003. His research focuses on Dynamics and Vibration Control, Smart Materials and Structures, Microfluidics and Lab on a Chip. He serves as chief editor or editorial board member for >10 international journals. Professor Li was appointed to the 2023 Australian Research Council (ARC) College of Experts. He is a recipient of Fellow of Engineers Australia, Fellow of the Institute of Physics (UK), JSPS Invitation Fellowship, Australian Endeavour Fellowship, Vice-Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Research Supervision, Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Interdisciplinary Research Excellence and numerous Best Paper Awards.