Comparative study on damping performance of different shape memory polymers

Abstract

Vibration analysis using an unconstrained layer damping for surface damping treatment is presented in the paper. The layer made of viscoelstic material is applied over the structure on single side known as an unsymmetrical unconstrained layer damping treatment is discussed along with the same material is glued on two sides of the surface called as symmetrical unconstrained layer damping treatment. In the present investigation, based on UTM and DMA tests, different analytical studies were carried out using shape memory polymers such as polyurethane, silicone, and butyl rubbers as damping materials for symmetrical and unsymmetrical configurations with damping layer thicknesses of 10 mm to evaluate the damping performance of unconstrained layer damped specimens. The feasibility studies of all the selected shape memory polymers revealed that the structure layered with butyl rubber gives better results than others in reducing vibration amplitude when the possibility of rectangular and cylindrical cavities in the layer are considered and discussed. The extensional damped samples were modeled using the modeling software tool, i.e. Solid Works, and modal analysis was carried out on the ANSYS workbench. Finally, the whole structure’s damping is predicted using RKU (Ross-Kerwin-Ungar) analysis, and the optimum values of system’s loss factor are obtained using Python programming.