An improved principle is proposed in this paper to achieve a more efficient amplitude suppression of an oscillating pendulum by a controllable moving mass. By establishing the governing equation of the pendulum with a moving mass, several suppression rules are presented to stipulate the motion parameters of the moving mass. The damping ratio is introduced to quantify the suppression effects generated by the mass intermittent motion. With the verification of the accuracy of the present model, some simulation has been taken to get the maximum damping ratio and solve the problem of the nonsynchronous motion. The simulation results show that the new principle is a more powerful control method for the oscillation problem of a pendulum. It is suggested that the new method should carry out the relevant active control experiment in the future research.

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