Italian suspension specialist Andreani’s DB4 test bench is now ready to ship and is a major step forward from the DB3 that Giuseppe Andreani introduced eight years ago.
“We have rebuilt the entire concept,” Giuseppe says. “The new DB4 is an evolution of our previous experience with our DB3, which was for the last eight years one of our best suspension machines. Our engineers have developed new software and hardware, with the software marking the revolution.
“We focused on precision, ease of reading, managing and comparing data. This is giving the suspension technicians the final tool to develop and test material, and my technicians, together with the engineers, worked on a professional and problem-free software and hardware.”
This new suspension dynamometer features optimised design, engineering and software. The 4kW powerful motor, the load cell that allows reading up to 5.000 Newton force, the 800 mm side rods and the simple and versatile software are all said to make the DB4 “easy to use, but very accurate”.
“The process is very simple: turn on the dynamometer, adjust the stroke you need according to the suspension that has to be measured (it is adjustable from 20 to 100 mm), fix the suspension on the machine, adjusting height and position according to the stroke, then enter the required speeds and cycles for each speed, and start the test. The powerful 4kW AC motor allows you to test shock absorbers and forks in a wide range of speed and loads, choosing between several stroke settings.”
DB4 advanced features allow any suspension operator to visualise real time shock and fork load vs velocity graphs, compare different click settings and valving options, measure dynamic suspension parameters and detect any operating anomalies.
It includes a state-of-the-art, real-time dedicated controller board that ensures a stable and reliable automatic and deterministic data acquisition, while the software provides an intuitive graphical user interface for data acquisition and simple but powerful tools for suspension analysis. It is compatible with the most common operating systems, and, as it is plug-and-play, does not require a dedicated laptop.
“The graphs and numerical outputs of the software and its sophisticated algorithms allow you to fully characterise the suspension thanks to peak velocity, load displacement and instantaneous velocity graphs,” says Giuseppe. In addition to the viscous response of the suspension, a suspension dyno provides the following outputs: gas preload, mean gas-spring rate and static friction.
Custom versions of the software can include hysteresis analysis, dissipated energy and damping coefficient calculations.
ANDREANI GROUP INTERNATIONAL
www.andreanigroup.com
