Products & Services – Passive Vibration Reduction Solutions
IPTRADE, Inc's experience with diverse materials as well as novel and conventional manufacturing techniques allows us to create exceptional passive vibration reduction solutions. We design customized products based on the customer's needs, taking into consideration material properties, ease of manufacture, and ability to move to full production, among other factors. Our extensive FEA knowledge guides us in this pursuit. Our relationships with manufacturers let us move seamlessly into prototype and production. The case studies described below detail some of our passive vibration reduction solutions to date.
Honeycomb Sandwich Structures
Major structural components in precision manufacturing equipment are often made of very high stiffness, high-mass materials (e.g. steel casting, granite). The price for the high stiffness of these materials is often very high mass and very low damping, resulting in poor dynamic performance. IPTRADE developed a radically different solution based on the honeycomb sandwich with integrated damping layer concept widely used in the aerospace industry. Our understanding of the unique requirements of precision manufacturing allowed us to adapt this concept to precision manufacturing. The result is a structure that is 50% less massive and at least 20 times more heavily damped.
Figure 1 shows a typical configuration of a highly damped, lightweight honeycomb sandwich structure for use in major components of precision manufacturing equipment. Figure 2 shows the assembled view and Figure 3 the actual product before final machining.
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Composites Stuctures
On a smaller scale, IPTRADE Inc. redesigned a linear motor housing, adding stiffness and damping while remaining competitive on price. High-stiffness material was added farthest from the neutral axis, where stiffness has the largest effect. Low-stiffness, high-damping material was added near the neutral axis, where stiffness is least important. The high-stiffness material was carbon and boron fiber composite — a high strength, low weight solution. The high-damping material, nylon, was made with a special additive machining technique that also allowed integral cooling channels to be made inexpensively. These innovations resulted in a damped structure that was also 35% less massive and 15% stiffer, creating a first vibration mode that was 30% higher.
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