Parametric Study of Damping Characteristics of Magneto-Rheological Damper: Mathematical and Experimental Approach

The present research work is a part of a project was a semi-active structural control technique using magneto-rheological damper has to be performed. Magneto-rheological dampers are an innovative class of semi-active devices that mesh well with the demands and constraints of seismic applications; this includes having very low power requirements and adaptability. A small stroke magneto-rheological damper was mathematically simulated and experimentally tested. The damper was subjected to periodic excitations of different amplitudes and frequencies at varying voltage. The damper was mathematically modeled using parametric Modified Bouc-Wen model of magneto-rheological damper in MATLAB/SIMULINK and the parameters of the model were set as per the prototype available. The variation of mechanical properties of magneto-rheological damper like damping coefficient and damping force with a change in amplitude, frequency and voltage were experimentally verified on INSTRON 8800 testing machine. It was observed that damping force produced by the damper depended on the frequency as well, in addition to the input voltage and amplitude of the excitation. While the damping coefficient (c) is independent of the frequency of excitation it varies with the amplitude of excitation and input voltage. The variation of the damping coefficient with amplitude and input voltage is linear and quadratic respectively. More ever the mathematical model simulated in MATLAB was in agreement with the experimental results obtained.

Optimal Design of Passive and Active Control Systems in Seismic-excited Structures Using a New Modified TLBO

Vibration control devices have recently been used in structures subjected to wind and earthquake excitations. The optimal design problems of the passive control device and the feedback gain matrix of the controller for the seismic-excited structures are some attractive problems for researches to develop optimization algorithms with the advancement in terms of simplicity, accuracy, speed, and efficacy. In this paper, a new modified teaching–learning-based optimization (TLBO) algorithm, known as MTLBO, is proposed for the problems. For some benchmark optimization functions and constrained engineering problems, the validity, efficacy, and reliability of the MTLBO are firstly assessed and compared to other optimization algorithms in the literature. The undertaken statistical indicate that the MTLBO performs better and reliable than some other algorithms studied here. The performance of the MTLBO will then be explored for two passive and active structural control problems. It is concluded that the MTLBO algorithm is capable of giving better results than conventional TLBO. Hence, its utilization as a simple, fast, and powerful optimization tool to solve particular engineering optimization problems is recommended.