Degradation Phenomenon of Electrical Contacts by 3-D Oscillating Mechanism:3-D Oscillating Mechanism for Trial

The authors have developed the mechanism which gives real vibration to electrical contacts by hammering oscillation in the vertical direction and also a sliding contact mechanism by a magnetostrictive actuator. By using both mechanisms, the influences of a micro-oscillating on contact resistance are examined. Further, 3D oscillation mechanism has been designed to simulate real vibrations that expanded 1D oscillation mechanism (that is to say hammering oscillation mechanism and sliding contact mechanism) into 3D. And the fundamental characteristics of the mechanism are obtained, such as acceleration and displacement at various frequencies, output wave forms to sinusoidal inputs, and mechanical interferences in the X, Y, and Z-directions of the stage. Experimental results suggested that the mechanism could detect more real degradation phenomenon on contacts by the influences of micro-vibration. However, it is necessary that the mechanism should be improved, for instance, in precision mechanism and in feedback control.