A Novel Method for Estimating and Balancing the Second Harmonic Error of Cylindrical Fused Silica Resonators

The cylindrical resonator gyroscope (CRG) is a type of Coriolis vibratory gyroscope which measures the angular velocity or angle through the precession of the elastic wave of the cylindrical resonator. The cylindrical fused silica resonator is an essential component of the CRG, the symmetry of which determines the bias drift and vibration stability of the gyroscope. The manufacturing errors breaking the symmetry of the resonator are usually described by Fourier series, and most studies are only focusing on analyzing and reducing the fourth harmonic error, the main error source of bias drift. The second harmonic error also is one of the obstacles for CRG towards high precision. Therefore, this paper provides a chemical method to evaluate and balance the second harmonic error of cylindrical fused silica resonators. The relation between the frequency split of the n = 1 mode and the second harmonic error of the resonator is obtained. Simulations are performed to analyze the effects of the first three harmonic errors on the frequency splits. The relation between the location of the low-frequency axis of n = 1 mode and the heavy axis of the second harmonic error is also analyzed by simulation. Chemical balancing experiments on two fused silica resonators demonstrate the feasibility of this balancing procedure, and show good consistency with theoretical and simulation analysis. The second harmonic error of the two resonators is reduced by 86.6% and 79.8%, respectively.