Active damping of thermally induced vibrations

The prospect of using active damping in a smart structure to suppress thermally induced vibration is investigated. Here smart structure refers to an aluminum structure with an integrated active control system consisting of piezoceramic sensors and actuators. A simply supported aluminum beam is used to illustrate the nature of thermally induced vibrations caused by a suddenly applied heat flux. A distributed piezoelectric self-sensing sensor/actuator pair is implemented to actively suppress the motion caused by thermal disturbances. The effect of large temperature changes on the structure and actuator are taken into account in the control system design. A proportional-derivative controller, a linear quadratic regulator and a positive position feedback filter are considered. Simulation results show that thermally induced vibrations can be damped using currently available smart structure technology, provided temperature effects are properly accounted for in the control law.