On the Parametric Excitation of Pendulum-Type Vibration Absorber

The free motion of an undamped pendulum-type vibration absorber is studied on the basis of approximate nonlinear equations of motion. It is shown that this type of mechanical system exhibits the phenomenon of auto parametric excitation; a type of “instability” which cannot be accounted for on the basis of the linearized system. Complete energy transfer between modes is shown to occur when the beam frequency is twice the simple pendulum frequency. On the basis of a numerical solution, approximately 150 cycles of the beam oscillation take place during a single cycle of energy interchange.