Vibration Control of Cylindrical Piezoelectric Transducers Utilizing Stepped-Thickness Configurations

Piezoelectric transducers have been extensively investigated for their widespread use in a variety of sensing and actuation applications. Among them, cylindrical piezoelectric transducers have received less attention despite their strong potential. The aim of this work is to investigate vibration mode shape control by introducing axial and circumferential steps in the thickness of these transducers. The efficacy of introducing these steps has been investigated through ANSYS simulations and is subsequently validated using Laser Scanning Vibrometer to obtain the mode shapes experimentally. Electrical impedance measurements have also been done to obtain the resonance and anti-resonance frequencies and the effective electromechanical coupling factor. The results show that steps can control vibration through two mechanisms. (i) Circumferential steps can excite modes whose circumferential mode numbers match the number of steps. These specific modes occur within a frequency range that is entirely absent in uniform thickness transducers. (ii) Axial steps can localize and amplify the vibration amplitude for axial vibration modes. Having validated the efficacy of these steps in controlling vibration modes, some experiments were done to evaluate the effect of these steps on the performance of these transducers as acoustic actuators. The strength of the acoustic field generated inside these transducers was measured experimentally using a precision microphone and it was shown that the stepped transducers can generate around 1.5 times stronger acoustic field as compared to the uniform thickness transducer. Electrical impedance results revealed that stepped transducers had lower effective electromechanical coupling factors. However, this may suggest they can provide narrowband transducers which may have numerous precision applications. These results may suggest that employing steps could control vibration, enhance the performance of cylindrical piezoelectric transducers and improve their uptake as sensors or actuators for biomedical or food industries as well as other industrial applications.