Design, analysis and experimental investigation of three-dimensional structures with inertial amplification induced vibration stop bands

• 3D structures are built using an inertial amplification mechanism as building block.
• The building block mechanism is optimized to obtain wide vibration stop bands.
• An octahedron structure and its 2 × 3 array is manufactured using a 3D printer.
• Numerically and experimentally obtained frequency response results match.
• Wide vibration stop bands are experimentally shown for all directions in 3D.

Three-dimensional (3D) phononic band gap structures are formed using identical inertial amplification mechanisms. The resonance and antiresonance frequencies that characterize the first vibration stop band of the building block mechanism are obtained analytically and by finite element method. The mechanism is optimized to yield wide vibration stop bands in two different 3D structures, namely, an octahedron and a 2 × 3 array of octahedrons. Furthermore, these structures are manufactured using a 3D polymer printer and their experimental frequency responses are obtained. Structural damping is added to the finite element model in order to match the resonant peak magnitudes of the numerical and experimental frequency response results. It is demonstrated that the 3D structures are capable of isolating excitations in longitudinal and two transverse directions in a very wide frequency range.