Experimental bifurcations and chaos in a modified self-sustained macro electromechanical system

A class of self-sustained Macro ElectroMechanical (MaEMS) Systems is made up of a Rayleigh–Duffing oscillator actuating a mechanical arm through a magnetic coupling. In this paper, to avoid experimental constraints, an audio amplifier is added to the device. Quenching phenomenon, bifurcation and chaos are predicted and shown to occur in a device of this class of MaEMS. Especially by using linear stability analysis, the condition for the quenching phenomenon is derived. Chaos and bifurcation are predicted using Lyapunov exponent and bifurcation diagram. A prototype of device is designed and fabricated. Experimental results for this device that are consistent with results from theoretical investigations are presented and convincingly show quenching phenomenon, bifurcation and chaos.