Dynamics of Two Coupled van der Pol Oscillators with Delay Coupling Revisited

Abstract: The problem of two van der Pol oscillators coupled by velocity delay terms was studied by Wirkus and Rand in 2002. The small-epsilon analysis resulted in a slow flow which contained delay terms. To simplify the analysis, Wirkus and Rand followed a common procedure of replacing the delay terms by non-delayed terms, a step said to be valid for small epsilon, resulting in a slow flow which was an ODE rather than a DDE (delay-differential equation). In the present paper we consider the same problem but leave the delay terms in the slow flow, thereby offering an evaluation of the approximate simplification made previously.