Design of a Damped Vibration Absorber for Longitudinal Vibration Control of a Hollow Shaft

With the increasing size of marine vessels, the damage of the longitudinal vibration of shaft system is increasingly exposed. This paper deals with the application of a Damped Vibration Absorber (DVA) to a hollow shaft to attenuate its longitudinal vibration. The coupled model of a shaft with a DVA is established and the coupling properties due to the introduction of the DVA into the shaft are analyzed with Transfer Matrix (TM) method, combining with the Substructure Synthesis (SS) method. Furthermore, the proposed TM method is verified by the Finite Element (FE) method using ANSYS software. Results of theoretical calculation and FE method simulation indicate an excellent vibration reduction performance of the DVA. In addition, a DVA sample is presented and then an experimental verification is conducted to validate the actual control performance. The experimental results show that the resonance peak is strongly attenuated when DVA attached to the shaft, which proved that the vibration reduction performance of the DVA is significant. Due to the hollow features of a large marine ship propulsion shafting system, a DVA can be mounted into the void location of the hollow shaft occupying no extra space and provide efficient and easy-realization technology for the control of longitudinal vibration of marine ship propulsion shafting system in future.