Brake squeal has been a major concern throughout the automotive industry. Structural modification is a practical and effective way to reduce brake squeal. However, few if any, systematic techniques exist to guide in this structural modification. In this work, a sensitivity analysis for brake squeal control is presented. The critical value of friction coefficient is used as a measure of squeal propensity. Based on the reduced-order characteristic equation method which can accurately estimate the critical value of friction coefficient, a sensitivity analysis of system stability with respect to lining stiffness and lining geometry is presented for a drum brake system. The sensitivity analysis can be conducted without creating new system models or performing a full complex eigenvalue analysis. Furthermore, the sensitivity analysis reveals the regions of contact area which have strong influence on squeal. It is shown that the separation of elastically coupled frequencies is influenced by the grooves in lining material, and the frequency variation can be related to the mode shapes of the drum and the shoes.
New Recursive Formulas for Eigenvalue Sensitivity Analysis
