Investigation of curved polymeric piezoelectric active diaphragms

Piezoelectric active diaphragms hold promise as an alternative to using passive diaphragms driven by voice coils for sound generation and noise cancellation applications. This paper presents an in-depth investigation of the acoustic response for curved polymeric piezoelectric active diaphragms. Simple analytical models were derived and experimentally validated to predict the structural dynamic and acoustic responses for generic polyvinylidene fluoride (PVdF) constant curvature active diaphragms with variable geometric parameters (width, radius, subtended angle, thickness). These models are useful for design purposes and for capturing the overall behavioral trends. To analyze the acoustic response mechanisms further, three-dimensional numerical models were also developed and experimentally validated. Parametric studies based upon these models reveal the potential of high acoustic outputs (over 100 dB in the far field) from optimized geometric configurations with subtended angles differing from the conventionally utilized flat, semicircular or circular configurations. These studies, corroborated by experiments on a variety of active diaphragm prototypes, conclude that the acoustic output is governed by the structural ring resonance, which can be designed such that the most efficient acoustic radiation is within the particular frequency range of operation. [DOI: 10.1115/1.1547461]