Impact-induced vibration in vehicular driveline systems: theoretical and experimental investigations

The paper investigates the conditions leading to the emergence and persistence of an acute metallic noise in light-truck drivelines. Sudden demands in torque in the presence of lash zones give rise to this phenomenon, which is onomatopoeically referred to as clonk. The study of clonk requires combined rigid multi-body dynamics and flexible body oscillations. The results show high-frequency contributions in the driveline vibrational response of certain structural modes of the driveshaft pieces, which are induced by remote impact of meshing transmission teeth through backlash. The numerically predicted spectrum of vibration shows good correlation with experimental measurements of radiated noise from a dynamic drivetrain rig.