Electro-Mechanical Analogies for Modeling the Structural Impedance Response

摘要

Electro-mechanical (E/M) impedance is a powerful structural identification and health monitoring (SHM) technique that allows for inferring high-frequency structural dynamic characteristics directly by interrogating a network of embedded piezoelectric active sensors. In recent years, there has been a considerable interest in expanding range of applications of the electromechanical impedance technique, its synergistic integration into complementary SHM methodologies, and miniaturizing the associated impedance measurement circuitry. The present work is aimed at developing an E/M impedance modeling approach that explores analogies between electrical and mechanical systems and permits representation of the mechanical system elements in terms of equivalent electrical circuits. The advantage of such a representation is that analytical modeling is substantially simplified by considering a network of electrical elements, mechanical quantities are incorporated directly into the electrical model of a measurement unit, and modern circuit design, simulation and analysis software tools can be employed to improve the method performance. The electromechanical model of a piezoelectric impedance sensor is discussed and development of the electrical circuit representation of the sensor-structure interaction is presented. The proposed electrical and existing mechanical models are compared showing a good agreement. Applicability of the developed modeling approach is discussed and examples of numerical calculations are provided. It is suggested that describing a sensor-structure electro-mechanical system in terms of electro-mechanical analogies could simplify analytical modeling and improve instrumentation design.