Error Correction and Reanalysis of the Vibration Analysis of a Piezoelectric Ultrasonic Atomizer to Control Atomization Rate

Abstract

Dynamic mesh atomizers have been widely used in various fields because of their compact structure, low energy consumption, and low production costs. The finite element method is an important technique to analyze the factors affecting the atomization performance of dynamic mesh atomizers. However, at present, there is a lack of decisive solutions to the basic problems of boundary setting in terms of the simulation and vibration displacement characteristics of atomizers under different vibration modes. In this paper, two errors were found in the Vibration Analysis of a Piezoelectric Ultrasonic Atomizer to Control Atomization Rate paper written by Esteban Guerra-Bravo et al. in 2021. First, in the finite element analysis, the boundary condition of the atomizing sheet was set to be fixed, which is inconsistent with the actual support situation and seriously affects the vibration of the atomizing sheet. Second, in the simulation result, from the first mode to the third mode, the growth rate of the maximum displacement at the center of the atomizing sheet was as high as 77.12%, even up to 221.05%, which is inconsistent with the existing vibration theory. In view of these errors, in this paper, the working principle of dynamic mesh atomizers is analyzed and the vibration equation of the atomizing sheet under peripheral simple support is derived. Through comparison with the literature, it was proven that the boundary setting and vibration displacement of the atomizing sheet in the original paper are unreasonable. By measuring the atomizing rate of the atomizing sheet under different boundary conditions, it was proven that the peripheral freedom of the atomizing sheet should be greater than or equal to 1, namely, peripheral freedom or peripheral simply supported. The vibration displacement theory was used for the simulation, and the relationship between the vibration displacement and resonant frequency of the atomizing sheet under peripheral simple support was measured. It was found that with the increase in the resonance frequency, the maximum displacement of vibration modes with only nodal circles was larger than that of the other vibration modes, and the maximum displacement increased slightly with the increase in the number of nodal circles by about 0.98%.