Enhanced Vibration Damping Performance of Pre-stressed Granular Materials: Experimental Investigation

Abstract

Granular materials hold significant promise for the development of high-performance, lightweight vibrationdamping elements, offering increased levels of safety and comfort. This study focuses on exploring the vibration damping properties of pre-stressed granular material. A comprehensive investigation is conducted, to show by how much the damping properties can be improved in a simple solution if the solid material is replaced by granulate from the same material, while maintaining the macro geometry. Experimental results demonstrate that the granular material exhibits a remarkable improvement of up to 560 % in vibration damping performance compared to the same bulk material.

This enhancement is attributed to the synergistic effects of two governing factors. Firstly, the pressure-frequency superposition principle operates at the molecular scale, particularly prominent under high pre-stress conditions. Secondly, physical interactions between granules, commonly referred to as the strong force-network phenomenon, play a vital role at the macro scale, particularly influential under low pre-stress conditions. The combination of these effects that complement each other, results in overall superior energy absorption performance.