Stability analysis and vibration suppression in an overhung rotor system using active magnetic damper

The present work demonstrates the effectiveness of an active magnetic damper (AMD) in improving the vibration characteristics of an overhung rotor system (ORS) considering the effects of synchronous mass-unbalance, rotor bow, and viscous internal damping. A finite element-based rotordynamic analysis has been conducted to evaluate the system response using state-space formulation. MATLAB codes are developed for the numerical implementation of the rotordynamic model pertaining to the flexible ORS integrated with an AMD consisting of three parallel feedback loops. The internal damping is found to reduce the vibration amplitudes at the bearing and disk locations. However, it leads to system instability in the absence of AMD beyond the first critical speed (670 RPM) which is indicated by the change in the real part of eigenvalues. Under these circumstances, the use of AMD causes a remarkable improvement and the system stabilizes for almost the entire speed range considered here, 320-10,000 RPM. In addition, the AMD causes a maximum reduction of 95.8%, 96.5%, and 83.3% in the vibration amplitudes at the locations of Bearing 1, Bearing 2, and the overhung disk, respectively. Using an appropriate set of AMD parameters, the system characteristics can be altered effectively as per the requirement.