Title: Investigation and analysis of hydraulic cylinder cushioning of excavator

Authors: Venkatesan Govindarajalu; Palaniswamy Sadagopan

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Suguna College of Engineering, Coimbatore, 641014, India ' Department of Production Engineering, PSG College of Technology, Coimbatore, 641004, India

Abstract: Hydraulic cylinders are linear actuators used in applications such as excavators. The backhoe of an excavator can dig with enormous force and its movements are carried out by hydraulic system. The piston movement swings the backhoe in seconds and if not slowed down at the end using cushioning, it stops suddenly causing jerk, vibration and bounce leading to higher maintenance cost. The size and profile of cushion nose plays an important role in slowing down the piston movement. In this work, an attempt is made to investigate the cushioning effect by changing the size and profile of the cushion nose that cause pressure variation using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). From the results, design of experiments (DOE) analysis is carried to find the most significant factor that affects the back pressure. It is found that the cushion nose with curved internal profile produces better results as compared to the existing taper and other profile variations.

Keywords: hydraulic cylinder; cushioning; excavator; backhoe; cylinder cushion; cushion nose profile; deceleration; actuator; CFD; computational fluid dynamics; DFMA; design for manufacturing and assembly; DOE; design of experiments.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHVS.2021.120914

International Journal of Heavy Vehicle Systems, 2021 Vol.28 No.5, pp.612 - 629

Received: 28 Dec 2019
Accepted: 31 Mar 2020
Published online: 17 Feb 2022 *

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