Steady-state stability and bifurcations of friction oscillators due to velocity-dependent friction characteristics

Abstract

This article presents an analytical investigation on stability and bifurcation behaviour due to an exponential and a generalized friction characteristics in the sliding domain of a simple friction oscillator, which is commonly referred to as ‘mass-on-a-belt’ oscillator. The friction is described by a friction coefficient which depends on the relative velocity between the two tribological partners. The standard way of examining the steady-state only gives very rough insight in the behaviour and is not able to provide further informations about the steady-state's basin of attraction or about limit-cycles. It is found that the system may undergo bifurcations of Hopf type. Hereby, the character of the bifurcations strongly depends on the parameters of the friction characteristic.