Design and Testing of a Novel Magneto-Rheological Clutch with Tooth-Shaped Rotor

Abstract

AbstractThis research focuses on development of a new configuration of magneto-rheological clutch (MRC) featuring a tooth-shaped disc with multiple teeth acting as multiple magnetic poles of the clutch. The tooth shaped disc is placed in a clutch housing composed of the left housing and the right housing. The inner face the housing also has tooth shaped features mating with the teeth of the disc via MRF layer. Excitation coils are placed directly on stationary winding cores placed on both side of the clutch housing. A air gap of 0.25 mm is left between the housing and the winding cores to ensure the housing can freely rotate against the winding cores. By using a tooth shaped disc, more active interfacing area between the disc and the housing can be achieved and a high transmitted torque of the clutch is expected. After the introduction part, configuration of the proposed MRC is introduced and the transmitted torque of the MRC is derived. Optimization of the MRC considering mass and transmission torque is then conducted and the optimized MRC is evaluated by both simulation experimental works.KeywordsMR fluidMR clutchSpeed controlTooth-shaped rotor