Controlling the limit-cycle of the Ziegler column via a tuned piezoelectric damper

This paper is about the nonlinear analysis of a piezoelectric controlled Ziegler column. The piezoelectric controller, here referred to as Tuned Piezoelectric Damper (TPD), possesses evanescent characteristics and, moreover, it is tuned to the first natural frequency of the mechanical system, thus resembling the well-known Tuned Mass Damper. This means that the flow of energy between mechanical and electrical subsystems is driven by the resonance (Den Hartog principle) and magnified by the singularity of the evanescent electrical characteristics. Numerical simulations, showing how the proposed control strategy is effective in increasing the linear stability domain and decreasing the amplitude of the limit-cycles in the postcritical range, are presented.