Vibration Suppression of a Handheld Tool Using Intelligent Active Force Control (AFC)

This paper highlights a simulation study involving the application of an active force control (AFC) strategy to suppress vibration on the rear handle of a handheld tool. The research was carried out to investigate the performance in terms of vibration reduction capability of a feedback controller employing AFC-based schemes on a selected powered portable machine (Hedge Trimmer Maruyama model Ht230D). Four types of control schemes were closely examined and compared involving the classic proportional-integral-derivative (PID) control scheme, the AFC with crude approximation (AFCCA) method, the AFC with iterative learning method (AFCILM) and AFC with fuzzy logic (AFCFL) method. Inherent vibration was measured from the real operation of the handheld tool through operational deflection shape (ODS) experiment. This data was later used in the simulation work together with other forms of modelled disturbances to test the robustness of the control scheme. Results show that the AFC scheme is able to suppress the vibration at the rear handle much better compared to the conventional PID control scheme. The combination of AFC with fuzzy logic scheme provides the best performance for the AFC-based controllers.