Performance improvement of planar dielectric elastomer actuators by magnetic modulating mechanism

In this paper, a novel planar dielectric elastomer actuator (DEA) with magnetic modulating mechanism is proposed. This design can provide the availability of wider actuation range and larger output force, which are significant indicators to evaluate the performance of DEAs. The DEA tends to be a com...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Smart materials and structures 2018-06, Vol.27 (6), p.65007
Main Authors: Zhao, Yun-Hua, Li, Wen-Bo, Zhang, Wen-Ming, Yan, Han, Peng, Zhi-Ke, Meng, Guang
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
actuation range
dielectric elastomer actuator
magnetic modulating
output force
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Summary:In this paper, a novel planar dielectric elastomer actuator (DEA) with magnetic modulating mechanism is proposed. This design can provide the availability of wider actuation range and larger output force, which are significant indicators to evaluate the performance of DEAs. The DEA tends to be a compact and simple design, and an analytical model is developed to characterize the mechanical behavior. The result shows that the output force induced by the DEA can be improved by 76.90% under a certain applied voltage and initial magnet distance. Moreover, experiments are carried out to reveal the performance of the proposed DEA and validate the theoretical model. It demonstrates that the DEA using magnetic modulating mechanism can enlarge the actuation range and has more remarkable effect with decreasing initial magnet distance within the stable range. It can be useful to promote the applications of DEAs to soft robots and haptic feedback.
ISSN:0964-1726
1361-665X
DOI:10.1088/1361-665X/aabb6c