Frequency response of a piecewise linear system

Piecewise linear vibration isolators are designed to optimally balance the competing goals of motion control and isolation. The piecewise linear system represents a hard nonlinearity, which cannot be assumed small, and hence standard perturbation methods are unable to provide a complete analytical solution. To date there is no frequency response equation reported for piecewise linear isolator systems to include both dual damping and stiffness behavior. In this investigation an averaging method was adopted to explore the frequency response of a symmetric piecewise linear isolator at resonance. The result obtained by an averaging method is in agreement with numerical simulation and experimental measurements. Preliminary sensitivity analysis is conducted to find the effect of system parameters. It appears that the damping ratio plays a more dominant role than stiffness in piecewise linear vibration isolators.