Research on the performance of hydraulic excavator with pump and valve combined separate meter in and meter out circuits

Conventional hydraulic actuator is controlled by mechanically connected orifices valve. The controllability of this method is poor and the energy consumption is huge especially under the over-running condition. So a novel system configuration of the hydraulic excavator is presented to improve the problem mentioned above, in which boom cylinder, stick cylinder and swing motor are controlled with separate meter in and meter out technology, bucket cylinder and travel motors are controlled with conventional valves. Firstly, the paper provides a comprehensive review on the development of the separate meter in and meter out technology. Then the principles of load sensing system and SMISMO system applied on the excavator are illustrated though two diagram to show the difference of the two systems. And then a virtual prototype based on the real physical structures is established, which consists of the hydraulic excavator mechanical structure with multi-body dynamics and electro-hydraulic system. The model is verified by the statics and dynamics experiments. Then the dynamic, static performances as well as the energy consumption characteristics of the boom, arm and swing actuators are investigated under the condition of load sensing hydraulic system and the proposed system using the virtual prototype. The control strategy of the actuators is formulated according to their load condition and operation characteristics also based on the detailed analysis. After that, the physical prototype based on the proposed configuration system is established and its performance is tested. The experimental results show that the accuracy of the virtual prototype is validated; the proposed configuration system can significantly decreases the pressure losses through the valve and improve the energy efficiency of the machine; the pressure shocks within hydraulic actuators is decreased as well, thus the stationarity of the whole machine is improved accordingly.