Research on cylindrical resonators’

damping asymmetry trimming method

utilizing damping characteristic of
piezoelectric electrodes
Cite as: AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018); https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5016484
Submitted: 20 November 2017 . Accepted: 19 December 2017 . Published Online: 01 March 2018

Jiangkun Sun, Hong Tang, Yulie Wu, Xiang Xi, Yongmeng Zhang, and Xuezhong Wu

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© 2018 Author(s).
 AIP ADVANCES 8, 035101 (2018)

Research on cylindrical resonators’ damping asymmetry

trimming method utilizing damping characteristic
of piezoelectric electrodes
Jiangkun Sun, Hong Tang, Yulie Wu,a Xiang Xi, Yongmeng Zhang,
and Xuezhong Wu
College of Mechatronics Engineering and Automation, National University
of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China
(Received 20 November 2017; accepted 19 December 2017; published online 1 March 2018)

The damping asymmetry of cylindrical resonators is one of the major sources which
result in the gyroscope’s drift. In this paper, a new approach for trimming the
damping asymmetry of cylindrical resonators is proposed. The damping asymme-
try trimming model is established to analyze the additional damping’s influences.
Furthermore, piezoelectric electrodes’ effects on the cylindrical resonator’s damp-
ing characteristic are figured out through the finite element simulation. The proce-
dures of this trimming method are also summarized based on theoretical analysis.
At last, these theoretical analysis and simulation results are utilized to compensate
the damping asymmetry of cylindrical resonators and the procedures of this trim-
ming method are also summarized. Experiments are also implemented to verify
this trimming method. © 2017 Author(s). All article content, except where oth-
erwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5016484

I. INTRODUCTION
The cylindrical vibratory gyroscope (CVG) is a type of solid-wave gyroscope which senses
the angular rate based on the inertia effect of the elastic wave.1 It possesses an axisymmetric shell,
which has advantages of manufacturing easily, long lifetime, short start-up time and good shock
resistance. Hence the cylindrical gyroscope has good potential for application in many fields such as
avionics systems, borehole surveying, missiles, naval equipment, platform stabilization, robotics, etc.2
At present, many companies and institutes have shown great interest in CVG.
The performance of CVG is determined by the quality of cylindrical resonators whose imperfec-
tions reflected as stiffness and damping asymmetry are mainly caused by inhomogeneous material and
manufacture defects.3 The negative effects of asymmetric stiffness could be eliminated or removed
through resonator’s mechanical trimming and force-rebalance closed-loop control.4 Hence, damping
asymmetry has a negative impact on the vibration plane which will drift toward the axis of lowest
damping and becomes the major drift source which decreases the performance of gyroscope.5 Many
researchers and institutions have explored some trimming methods to reduce the influences of damp-
ing asymmetry. The velocity feedback control can be applied to remove the cylindrical resonators’
damping asymmetry to a certain degree.6 However, the control effect of this method is limited when
the damping asymmetry is relatively large. The method of self-calibration is another way to eliminate
the damping asymmetry’s effect and it is based on moving the pattern angle by 90 electrical degrees
which is called the gyro’s “mode reversing”. After self-calibration compensation, the gyro produces
a bias with the same magnitude but opposite polarity. As a result, the gyro’s drift caused by the damp-
ing asymmetry is able to be counteracted by the superimposing two modes’ biases. This method has
already been implemented on Boeing’s MEMS disc resonator gyroscope and Northrop Grumman’s

a
Correspondence: wuyulie nudt@163.com; Tel.: +86-0731-8457-4958

2158-3226/2018/8(3)/035101/9 8, 035101-1 © Author(s) 2017

035101-2 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

hemispherical resonator gyroscope.7,8 But the bandwidth of gyroscope using this method is narrow
and the control algorithm is relatively complex.
Piezoelectric electrodes are commonly pasted on the vibratory structure for precise actuation
and detection.9 The resonators’ damping characteristic which is vital to the high-performance gyro
is required to be homogeneous distribution, small and stable. What is more, it will be modified and
result in some unexpected errors after pasting piezoelectric electrodes. On the contrary, piezoelectric
electrodes’ damping characteristic can be used to trim cylindrical resonators’ damping asymme-
try through adjusting the piezoelectric electrodes’ dimension parameters. Hence, a novel trimming
method of cylindrical resonators’ damping asymmetry is proposed in this paper. Experiments are also
included to validate this trimming method.

II. GYRO DESCRIPTION

A. Basic concepts
As shown in the Figure 1, the typical structure of a cylindrical shell vibratory gyroscope consists
of a rigid substrate, a bottom plate and a cylindrical wall. Eight piezoelectric electrodes should
be pasted on the bottom plate and separated from each other by 45◦ .10 The process of pasting
piezoelectric electrodes is easily understood. Eight grooves on the location base are designed to
ensure the piezoelectric electrodes’ orientation accuracy. Furthermore, a nut and a spring are used to
provide proper strength on the piezoelectric electrodes because they are thin and fragile.11
The operational principle of the cylindrical resonator gyroscope is illustrated in Figure 2. The
resonator is excited into the driving mode when a varying voltage is applied on the driving electrodes.

FIG. 1. Structure of the CRG and schematic of the pasting process.

FIG. 2. Schematic of the operation principle.

035101-3 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

FIG. 3. The simulation model and result.

As a result of Coriolis force effect, the sensing mode will also be excited when the gyroscope rotates.
Thus the angular velocity can be obtained by demodulating electrical signals of sensing electrodes.12
B. Finite element modeling
The finite element method is applied to analyze the piezoelectric electrodes’ effects on cylindrical
resonators’ damping characteristic. To be more specific, this finite element model is established based
on COMSOL software and isotropy loss factor is selected to represent the damping characteristic
of the resonator and piezoelectric electrodes. The meshed model of the resonator constructed by
the COMSOL software, as illustrated in the Figure 3. Cylindrical resonators’ structural parameters,
material parameters and other details can be figured out from our previous researches in the Ref. 13.
Then, the Q factor can be calculated through frequency-domain response analysis around the resonant
frequency of cylindrical resonators.

III. THEORETICAL ANALYSIS

A. Basic theory and compensation model of damping asymmetry
Cylindrical resonators’ damping asymmetry is inevitable due to material and manufacture imper-
fections. Furthermore, different axes in the cylindrical resonator have various energy decay time
constants. As shown in the Figure 4, the axes where the highest and lowest energy decay time con-
stants locate are called the principal damping axes. What is more, the damping values of damping axes
are 1/τ 1 and 1/τ 2 . Because the Q factor can be denoted as Q=πf r τ ( f r is the resonant frequency),

FIG. 4. Damping asymmetry trimming model.

035101-4 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

the damping asymmetry can be also expressed by the difference in Q factors of the cylindrical
resonator’s different axes.
The f1 , f2 and Q1 , Q2 are the resonant frequencies and quality factors of two principal damping
axes respectively. Furthermore, the frequency split ∆f is generally less than 0.1 Hz and it is too small
compared with Q1 and Q2 . Therefore, the damping asymmetry ∆(1/τ) can be presented as:6
1 1 1 πf1 πf2 1 1
∆( ) = − = − ≈ πf ( − ) (1)
τ τ1 τ2 Q1 Q2 Q1 Q2
where f =( f1 +f2 )/2 is the arithmetic mean value of f1 , f2 . Hence the damping asymmetry can be
represented as the difference in Q factors of the cylindrical resonator’s different axes.
According to the basic theory above, the cylindrical resonator’s damping asymmetry can be
represented as the difference in Q factors of its damping axes. Hence the damping asymmetry is able
to be removed via decreasing the difference between damping axes’ Q factors Q1 and Q2 . In other
words, the cylindrical resonator’s damping asymmetry is able to be trimmed if the Q factors of two
damping axes are adjustable.
As shown in the damping asymmetry trimming model, the damping asymmetry can be rep-
resented as two damping axes 1/τ 1 and 1/τ 2 before trimming. When the additional damping is
superposed on this model, it can be regarded as the equivalent damping axis. Assuming the angle
between the equivalent damping axis and damping axis 1/τ 2 is θ, the additional damping would
generate cos2θ component on the damping axis 1/τ 2 and sin2θ component on the damping axis 1/τ 1 .
Thus, the additional damping results in the damping axes’ rotation by a certain angle and the values
of damping axes are also altered to 1/τ10 and 1/τ20.
To trim the damping asymmetry, we expect to modify the value of one damping axis with another
invariable. Especially, the value of one damping axis can be modified alone without variation in the
value of another damping axis when the angle θ is equivalent to 0◦ or 45◦ . Furthermore, the locations
of damping axes are still in the same places. In other words, the damping asymmetry can be trimmed
more effectively when the equivalent damping axis is along with the damping axes.
In this paper, piezoelectric electrodes’ damping characteristic is utilized to trim the damping
asymmetry. In the first place, piezoelectric electrodes’ effects on the cylindrical resonator’s damping
characteristic must be figured out. The finite element method is utilized to simulate the piezoelectric
electrodes’ influence laws in this section. The damping characteristic of cylindrical resonator’s finite
element model is still homogeneous after adding eight piezoelectric electrodes because they are evenly
distributed. However, the damping asymmetry will appear when the eight piezoelectric electrodes’
dimensions are different.

B. Simulation analysis
The finite element model’s damping characteristic is homogeneous and there are no damping
axes under this circumstance. As shown in the Figure 5, the resonator’s damping increases when
four pairs of piezoelectric electrodes are pasted on its bottom. What is more, the damping axes still
do not exist because eight piezoelectric electrodes are evenly distributed. However, the cylindrical
resonator will have damping asymmetry and axes when the piezoelectric electrodes on the axis 1
are shortened by a certain length. Furthermore, the locations of piezoelectric electrodes are actu-
ally the orientation of damping axes. In other words, the minimum and maximum damping axes
are axis 1 and 2, respectively. Ideally, the modification of piezoelectric electrodes on the axis 1
only alters the Q factor of axis 1. However, the decrease of piezoelectric electrodes’ length on
the axis 1 also has a certain damping component on the axis 2 due to the width of piezoelectric
electrodes.
The modification of piezoelectric electrodes’ length on one axis produces effects on another axis.
This influence degree is called damping asymmetry trimming’s directivity which will be discussed
in the following section.
As shown in the Figure 6(a), the Q factor of axis 1 increases rapidly with the decrease
of piezoelectric electrodes’ length. Hence the outside edges of the piezoelectric electrodes have
greater effects on the cylindrical resonator’s damping characteristic than the inner edges. At the
same time, the Q factor of axis 2 also increases gradually because diminishment of piezoelectric
035101-5 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

FIG. 5. Cylindrical resonator with different states. (a) symmetrical distribution and (b) asymmetric distribution.

FIG. 6. The simulation results under different width. (a) W=2mm and (b) W=1mm.

electrodes’ length on the axis 1 also has a certain damping component on the axis 2. The out-
side edges of the piezoelectric electrodes have more damping component than the inner edges. In
other words, the damping asymmetry trimming’s directivity of inner edges is better than outside
edges.
As shown in the Figure 6(b), the Q factor’s variation trend is almost the same to the curve
W=2mm. However, the Q factor variation of axis 2 caused by the length alteration of piezoelectric
electrodes on axis 1 is about 587, which is much smaller than that under W=2mm. Furthermore, the
Q factors are almost the same when the length of piezoelectric electrodes on axis 1 alters from 5mm
to 8mm. In other words, the length variation of piezoelectric electrodes on the axis 1 has less damping
component on the axis 2 when the piezoelectric electrodes’ width decreases. Hence, piezoelectric
electrodes with smaller width are more suitable for damping asymmetry trimming.
Based on the above analysis, it can be summarized as follows: 1. The equivalent damping axis
caused by the additional damping should be aligned with the damping axes to increase the damping
asymmetry trimming’s efficiency. 2. Piezoelectric electrodes with smaller width are beneficial to
improve the damping asymmetry trimming’s directivity.

IV. EXPERIMENTS AND DISCUSSION

A. Experimental setup
As shown in the Figure 7, the schematic diagram and experimental system consist of the fre-
quency response analyzer (FRA), electromagnet, microphone and rotation stage. The sine frequency-
sweeping signal generated by FRA is transmitted to the electromagnet to excite the cylindri-
cal resonator. At the same time, the vibration signal is gathered by microphone and transferred
035101-6 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

FIG. 7. The schematic diagram and experimental system.

back to FRA. Thus, the frequency-response curve from which the Q factor can be calculated is
obtained.14 The Q factors of resonator’s different axial directions (Q factor circumferential distribu-
tion) are measured by controlling the rotation stage to spin from 0◦ to 180◦ with an interval of 5◦ . At
last, the cylindrical resonator’s damping asymmetry and damping axes are able to be identified via
analyzing its Q factor circumferential distribution.

B. Procedures of the trimming method

1. Identification of cylindrical resonator’s damping axes and asymmetry
The cylindrical resonators’ damping axes and asymmetry should be figured out at first before
trimming. As shown in the Figure 8, the cylindrical metallic resonator’s curve of the Q factor circum-
ferential distribution has the minimum damping axis and maximum damping axis whose Q factors
are Q1 and Q2 , respectively. Hence, cylindrical resonator’s damping asymmetry can be represented
by damping axes’ Q factors Q1 and Q2 in the equation (1).
2. Piezoelectric electrodes’ pasting process
After the identification of cylindrical resonator’s damping axes and asymmetry, eight piezoelec-
tric electrodes are evenly pasted on the locations of damping axes. As shown in the Figure 9, the
overall values of Q factor circumferential distribution decrease and the locations of damping axes
are almost in the same places. Hence piezoelectric electrodes on the damping axes can be utilized to
trim the damping asymmetry and the Q factor difference ∆Q=Q2 Q1 .
3. Determination of piezoelectric electrodes’ trimming dimension
As shown in the Figure 10, the axis 1 and axis 2 are the maximum and minimum damping axes
respectively. When the exciting force F is applied on the axis 1, the Q factor Q1 of axis 1 can be

FIG. 8. Q factor circumferential distribution of cylindrical resonator without piezoelectric electrodes.

035101-7 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

FIG. 9. Q factor circumferential distribution after pasting process.

figured out. Similarly, the Q factor Q2 of axis 2 can be also got by exciting on the axis 2. In order to
increase the Q factor Q1 , the piezoelectric electrodes on axis 1 are shortened from the inner edges.
The trimming dimensions of piezoelectric electrodes on axis 1 are able to be obtained when Q factor
Q1 is greater than Q factor Q2 by ∆Q.
4. Verification on the trimming results
As described above, the piezoelectric electrodes on the maximum axis are shortened to make the
Q factor Q1 more close to Q2 . Hence cylindrical resonator’s overall Q factors increase at the same
time and this trimming method can be defined as positive trimming. Similarly, adding piezoelectric
electrodes on the minimum axis can decrease the Q factor Q2 close to Q1 and result in the overall
Q factors’ reduction. This trimming method can be also defined as negative trimming.
As shown in the Figure 11(a), the positive trimming mainly makes use of resonators’ driving and
detecting piezoelectric electrodes with 2mm width and it does not need additional piezoelectric elec-
trodes. However, it also has some disadvantages. Firstly, lengths of resonators’ driving and detecting
piezoelectric electrodes are different, which will do harm to the gyro’s driving and detecting gains.
Secondly, the method’s trimming range is limited because piezoelectric electrodes can’t be shortened
too much. As shown in the Figure 11(b), the negative trimming usually adds piezoelectric electrodes
on the resonator’s inner surface. It needs additional piezoelectric electrodes and complicated pasting
process. Nonetheless, it can select piezoelectric electrodes with small width to improve the damping
asymmetry trimming’s directivity. What is more, this method’s trimming range is relatively large
because gyro’s driving and detecting gains don’t need to be concerned.
As shown in the Figure 12(a), the difference between Q1 and Q2 is about 509 after pasting
eight piezoelectric electrodes. In this verification experiment, the length of piezoelectric electrodes

FIG. 10. The cylindrical resonator’s finite element model.

035101-8 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

FIG. 11. Damping asymmetry’s trimming methods. (a) Positive trimming and (b) Negative trimming.

FIG. 12. Comparison of Q factor circumferential distribution before and after trimming. (a) Positive trimming result and
(b) Negative trimming result.

whose locations are on the maximum damping axis is shortened by 3mm according to simulation
results. After the positive trimming, the Q factor difference has been reduced to 108. As shown in
the Figure 12(b), piezoelectric electrodes with 1mm width and 3mm length are utilized for damping
asymmetry negative trimming. After the negative trimming, the Q factor difference has been reduced
to 95. For two trimming methods, the Q factor Q2 is not exactly equal to the Q factor Q1 because
there are some errors caused by the piezoelectric electrodes’ pasting process and simulation results.
However, these methods are very beneficial for cylindrical resonators with large damping asymmetry
and the remaining damping asymmetry after trimming is also more easily to be removed by closed-
loop control.

V. CONCLUSION
This paper presents a novel trimming method of damping asymmetry for cylindrical resonators
based on piezoelectric electrodes. The damping asymmetry can be trimmed more effectively when
the equivalent damping axis is along with the damping axes. Hence, piezoelectric electrodes should
be pasted on the damping axes. What is more, the inner edges of piezoelectric electrodes with smaller
width have less damping component on another damping axis. Under this circumstance, the Q factor
of one damping axis can be modified with another damping axis’ Q factor unchanged to trim the
damping asymmetry. The positive and negative trimming methods are proposed based on theoretical
analysis and experiments are also set up to verify these trimming methods.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to thank to the Laboratory of Microsystems, National University of
Defense Technology, China, for technical support and access to equipment. This work was supported
035101-9 Sun et al. AIP Advances 8, 035101 (2018)

by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 51335011 and 51505489) and
Pre-research Project of NUDT (JC15-03-03).
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