The characteristics of an automotive passenger seat in response to vibrational excitations are examined and an active vibration isolation system incorporating smart materials is designed, built, and tested. Human sensitivity to vibration is discussed. Characteristics of road roughness are discussed and used to implement a representative test input to a passenger seat system. extsc{Matlab} is used to model the car seat and vehicle system with four degrees of freedom to determine actuator requirements. Selection and implementation of a low--profile, prestressed piezoceramic device into an active seat suspension system is described, and experimental results of the actuator assembly performance are presented. Vibration isolation is realized in an experimental setup representing one quarter of a seat and passenger's total mass, using one actuator assembly (representing one corner of the seat suspension).

For an input power spectrum representative of a passenger vehicle environment, the smart material actuator assembly, as applied to a quarter seat experimental setup, is proven to be capable of isolating vibration with an isolation frequency of 2Hz and no resonant peak, versus 6Hz and a resonant peak of 2g/g for an actual passenger seat tested.