On the dynamic behaviour of axially excited helical springs

In this paper we have used Wittrick's theory on the propagation of deformation waves in a coiled wire — taking only into account the coupling between the displacements of the wire cross-section along the tangent and along the binormal of the average helix — in oder to show how the natural frequencies of the axial and rotational modes of a cylindrical helical spring vary according to a non-linear function of the wave number. Moreover it is here demonstrated that the natural frequencies resulting from the proposed theory for the natural modes to which correspond wave lengths greater than two coils do not differ much from those which can be calculated by considering the spring as a periodic discrete system. Theoretical results are finally tested by an appropriate experimental investigation.