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Articles

Analysis of non-linear response of the human body to vertical whole-body vibration

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Pages 1711-1723 | Received 11 Mar 2014, Accepted 03 Jul 2014, Published online: 08 Aug 2014
 

Abstract

The human response to vibration is typically studied using linear estimators of the frequency response function, although different literature works evidenced the presence of non-linear effects in whole-body vibration response. This paper analyses the apparent mass of standing subjects using the conditioned response techniques in order to understand the causes of the non-linear behaviour. The conditioned apparent masses were derived considering models of increasing complexity. The multiple coherence function was used as a figure of merit for the comparison between the linear and the non-linear models. The apparent mass of eight male subjects was studied in six configurations (combinations of three vibration magnitudes and two postures). The contribution of the non-linear terms was negligible and was endorsed to the change of modal parameters during the test. Since the effect of the inter-subject variability was larger than that due to the increase in vibration magnitude, the biodynamic response should be more meaningfully modelled using a linear estimator with uncertainty rather than looking for a non-linear modelling.

Abstract

Practitioner Summary: Causes of the non-linear body response to whole-body vibration are not clear. The biodynamic response of standing subjects (computed using the conditioned response techniques) evidenced that the non-linearity is due to the modal parameter changes during the test, but its effect is negligible in comparison with the inter-subject variability.

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