Historical development of high performance multi-axis vibration test systems

摘要

In the automotive sector, MIRA operate a Team Cube installed within a climatic environmental chamber. Here the cube is driven in concert with temperature, humidity and solar cycles; allowing 10-years use to be condensed into just two weeks of testing, Additional cyclic operations, hot or cold water/air flows and interrogation of the vehicle data-bus support the simultaneous replication of the entire vehicle environment. The use of vibration testing to identify structural weaknesses is a widely accepted method to improve product quality. Vibration testing using a sinusoidal input, a random input or a replication of a deterministic waveform has proven to be a critical step in successful product improvement. Though long recognised that multi-axis testing provides a more realistic representation of actual field conditions, historically, single axis testing was the method of choice. Primarily the lack of economical and effective multi-axis test hardware and control software was the cause. Significant advances have been made in both arenas resulting in test system designs that permit the application of multiple shakers and testing in multiple axes simultaneously.