Experimental Investigation of Adaptive Control Applied to HSFD Supported Rotors

Abstract

This paper describes the experimental application of adaptive control to Hybrid Squeeze Film Damper (HSFD) supported rotors. The HSFD has been shown to be an adaptive damper capable of providing infinite damper configurations between short and long damper configurations. Previously, theoretical investigations of the adaptive control of HSFD concentrated on the development of the model reference adaptive control (MRAC) method, as well as development of a nonlinear reference model. Simulations of the performance of the adaptive controller during run-up and coast-down indicated the superior performance of the adaptive controller. In this paper, the adaptive controller is tested on a multi-mode rotor. A test rig is designed and developed using computer control. A simple reference model is investigated consisting of a second order system. Three forms for adaptation gain are studied. The results of the experimental investigation illustrated the performance capabilities of the adaptive controller applied to the HSFD, and moreover indicated the possibility of simple design for the adaptive controller. [S0742-4795(00)01603-3]