Design optimization of rotor-bearing system considering critical speed using Taguchi method

The purpose of this study is to utilize Taguchi method, which can prove to be a handy and effective tool for determining minimum vibration response of rotor-bearing system set to avoid running at critical speed. In the study, three test cases considering different coupling type (elastic, jaw, and solid) and disc location (disc location A, B, and C) were conducted to observe behavioral changes of the shaft system considering vibration signatures. Each test case was conducted for three different shaft running speeds of 12, 18, and 24 Hz. To find the minimum peak amplitude values by experimenting different combinations of the rotor-bearing system set needs a lot of experiments for reaching solution. Moreover, the solution proves costly because of the time consumed in doing many experiments. This fact depicts the importance of an efficient optimization method to be used. Taguchi method can determine the design parameters, which have the greatest influence on the solution through a very limited number of experiments, for finding optimum set of rotor-bearing system. The method is performed using an iterative procedure to gain an optimum design.