Virbration damping device for vehicles

A vibration-damping impact device for damping vibrations of a vibrative member of a vehicle through elastic impacts, comprising:

• a rigid housing member formed integrally with or independently of the vibrative member and being subjected to the vibrations of the vibrative member, said housing member defining an accommodation space, wherein the rigid housing member is fixed to the vibrative member of the vehicle;
• and
• an independent mass member having a spherical outer surface and disposed non-adhesively in said accommodation space such that said independent mass member is opposed to an inner surface of said housing member defining said accommodation space, with a spacing therebetween, and is displaceable relative to said inner surface of said housing member, said independent mass member including a solid metallic mass body and an elastic body layer formed on and secured to an entire outer surface of said metallic mass body,
• said independent mass member being resiliently displaced to come into direct and elastic impact against said housing member at respective abutting surfaces thereof in a plurality of vibration input directions, upon application of the vibrations in said plurality of vibration input directions, so that the direct and elastic impact causes vibration-damping, and
• said independent mass member being disposed between a plurality of pairs of said abutting surfaces of said housing member in said plurality of vibration input directions with an approximately constant gap distance of 0.05-0.8 mm, so that the direct and elastic impact causes approximately constant damping effect in said plurality of vibration input directions.