VIBRATION ANALYSIS application example

Pulse hammer test for non-contact measurement of resonance frequency and vibration damping

Pulse hammer tests are used to measure a system's response to a short pulse at a specific location. By analyzing the measured response, the resonance frequency and damping behavior of the system can be determined.

The free vibration of an aluminium plate that is clamped at one side is measured with the fast RTSS system. The plate is accelerated by an impulse at the free end. The fast RTSS system achieves a measurement rate of 1500Hz and can therefore resolves motion frequencies up to 500Hz.
The left image shows the 100mm long free end of the plate. RTSS measures in real time and with sub micro meter resolution the displacement of the attached marker sticker.
The diagrams show the the time course of displacement and its fourier transformation. The measured natural frequency is 99,3 Hz.

This application example in the field of vibration analysis shows that when using a camera to measure vibrations, the natural frequency and damping properties of the component are not influenced.