Mounting Guidelines

Clamping instructions provided in this article are assuming you have purchased the either of our clamping kits ( KIT-008, or KIT-009)

Kit Clamping Instructions

Clamping the products is made easy with the PPA-5001 clamp base and PPA-5002 clamp bars. Select the desirable clamp location and align one clamp bar with the side alignment pins at the desired location. Then place the piezo beam on top of the clamp bar, using the alignment pins at the back of the clamp base. The second clamp bar is then placed on top, using the side alignment pins. Two 12mm M3 bolts can then be screwed down after nuts are placed in the bottom nut recesses. These recessed areas keep the nuts captive so that the bolts can be screwed down. The recommended torque that should be used is 1 N-m (8.85 in-lb). If a torque wrench is not available be sure to just use the provided hex key T handle and hand tighten to ensure the bolts are not over tightened and damage the piezo.

Warning

Over tightening the bolts could damage the piezo, we recommend a 1 N-m torque with a non-marred hard plastic or metal clamp.

Most applications that require these piezo products will have heavy vibration either from the piezos or environmental vibration that the piezos are sensing/harvesting from. Vibration can often loosen bolts over time which is why threadlocker is included with each kit. This threadlocker is reusable for testing and evaluation; but for long term testing Midé suggests a more permanent threadlocker solution. It is imperative to use some form of threadlocker or the boundary conditions at the clamp or tip mass can change with time which will result in a change of performance over time.

Example Kit Configurations

The KIT-009 clamping kit was designed for evaluation purposes and for Piezo.com wide range of customers and end applications. Therefore it was designed to be used in a great number of different configurations. Not only are there different clamp lines, there are different methods of mounting the base to your vibrating structure and mounting electronics or other hardware to the clamp base. The following image provides some example mounting methods.

The KIT-008 clamp enclosure kit was primarily designed for haptic/tactile feedback and energy harvesting evaluation purposes, but it can support other general purpose usage. The kit comes with two “bases” and one “top”. Effectively, one could make two different enclosures with the kit; one using one of the bases and the clear top, the other with two of the bases.

Piezo.com recommends the LOCTITE® Hysol® E-120HP™ epoxy for direct bonding of its piezo products to a structure. This two part, 24-hour cure, high-performance aerospace grade structural epoxy provides excellent adhesion to the piezo polyimide and FR4 exteriors. Piezo.com does not distribute the epoxy but it is available online.

Mounting Guidelines

In this Article

Kit Clamping Instructions

Warning

Example Kit Configurations

Bonding