Design and experiment of micro-vibration isolation system for optical satellite

In this paper, a kind of ring laminated damping structure, called the vibration isolation ring, is proposed based on the geometrical nonlinear characteristics of a ring structure and the viscoelastic damping of rubber material to suppress the micro-vibrations caused by the chiller on an optical module. The nonlinear dynamic modeling of the device with vibration isolation rings was carried out using the related theories of composite structures and beams; furthermore, the influences of different design parameters on the vibration isolation system were studied. Static stiffness tests were carried out to verify the nonlinear stiffness of the vibration isolation ring and deduce the system’s vibration transmissivity. The influences of different design parameters on the vibration isolation system were studied. It was found that the larger radius and smaller width could obtain a larger frequency range of vibration isolation and a smaller resonance peak while satisfying the bearing capacity requirement and space constraints. To obtain an accurate simulation model and provide a reference for subsequent structural optimization, a modal test and corresponding simulation analysis of the vibration isolation system were carried out. Finally, tests on the whole device’s sinusoidal frequency sweep vibrations were carried out. Simulation results in the time and frequency domains showed that the designed structure could effectively attenuate the micro-vibrations transmitted to the optical load. At the working frequency, the vibration isolation rate was more than 95%; thus, the vibration isolation ring exhibited good performances.