DYNAMIC CHARACTERISTICS OF MEMBRANE-TYPE AIR SPRINGS WITH AUXILIARY CHAMBER

Abstract

Air springs with auxiliary chambers are widely used by automobile manufacturers due to their lightweight design, low noise, superior shock absorption performance, and adjustable stiffness. The structural parameters of the auxiliary chamber and connecting pipeline play a decisive role in the shock absorption performance of air springs. This paper established a numerical simulation model for air springs with auxiliary chambers and studied the influence of the connecting pipeline diameter and the auxiliary chamber volume on the dynamic characteristics of air springs. The results indicate that, under the same initial internal pressure, the position where the stiffness tends to flatten shifts to higher frequencies as the pipeline diameter increases. As the pipeline diameter increased, the auxiliary chamber affected the stiffness over a broader frequency range. At lower loading frequencies, smaller pipeline diameters had a greater impact on stiffness, while larger pipeline diameters had a lesser impact. As the frequency increases, larger pipeline diameters gradually exert a stronger influence on stiffness. Between 2 and 6 Hz, the stiffness under different initial internal pressures decreased as the auxiliary chamber volume increased, while between 14 and 30 Hz, the opposite trend was observed. At all loading frequencies, the stiffness under different initial internal pressures decreased with increasing auxiliary chamber volume at 2 Hz, but as the loading frequency increased, this trend gradually reversed.