Hand Vibration Reduction Using Nonlinear Vibration Absorber for the Vibro-Impact Hammer Model

This work investigates the effectiveness of a passive vibration control device to minimize the amplitude of vibrations from a hand-held impact machine (HHIM) transmitted to a hand-arm system (HAS). For this purpose, we employ a simplified lumped parameter model of an HHIM and the hand-arm system consisting of lumped masses, springs, and viscous dampers. For a better understanding of the system dynamics, we use a vibro-impact model for a more accurate representation of HHIM–ground interactions. We then examine the effectiveness of a cubic nonlinear vibration absorber in minimizing these undesirable vibrations via a nonlinear bifurcation analysis of the system. A parametric study on the numerical bifurcation analysis of the system reveals the criticality of different design parameters of the proposed nonlinear vibration absorber on the system dynamics. Our findings demonstrate that an appropriate selection of absorber parameters could significantly change the amplitude and the periodicity of vibrations transmitted to the hand. Furthermore, we observe the existence of complex motions such as period-2, period-4, and chaotic attractors in the system for the given values of the absorber and operating parameters.