Study on an Active Accumulator. (Active Control of High-Frequency Pulsation of Flow Rate in Hydraulic Systems).

Abstract

Flow rate pulsation through pipelines due to hydraulic components is one of the most common sources of vibration and noise in hydraulic control systems. Among the flow rate pulsations caused by hydraulic piston pumps, which are commonly called fluid-borne noise, low-frequency pulsation can be easily absorbed and reduced by a passive element such as an accumulator. However, it is difficult to effectively reduce the high-frequency pulsation such as pulses using only passive elements. This paper concerns an active accumulator which is proposed and newly fabricated. It is driven directly by multilayered PZT devices to reduce the flow rate pulsation produced by hydraulic components in the high-frequency region. The active accumulator has the potential to actively reduce and cancel the variation in the high-frequency flow rate pulsation due to hydraulic piston pumps by producing and using inverse-phase flow by making use of fast-acting piezo-actuators.