Investigation on the viscoelastic behaviors of a circular dielectric elastomer membrane undergoing large deformation

Bing Wang,Zhengang Wang,Tianhu He

doi:10.1063/1.4973639

Abstract

To explore the time-dependent dissipative behaviors of a circular dielectric elastomer membrane subject to force and voltage, a viscoelastic model is formulated based on the nonlinear theory for dissipative dielectrics. The circular membrane is attached centrally to a light rigid disk and then connected to a fixed rigid ring. When subject to force and voltage, the membrane deforms into an out-of plane shape, undergoing large deformation. The governing equations to describe the large deformation are derived by using energy variational principle while the viscoelasticity of the membrane is describe by a two-unit spring-dashpot model. The evolutions of the considered variables and the deformed shape are illustrated graphically. In calculation, the effects of the voltage and the pre-stretch on the electromechanical behaviors of the membrane are examined and the results show that they significantly influence the electromechanical behaviors of the membrane. It is expected that the present model may provide some guidelines in the design and application of such dielectric elastomer transducers.

Highlights

As a class of electroactive polymers, dielectric elastomers (DEs) possess a unique attribute: large deformation
Most DEs are rubber-like materials and they often involve in time-dependent, dissipative processes, such as conductive relaxation, dielectric relaxation and viscoelastic relaxation.[27,28]
We formulate a viscoelastic model for a dielectric elastomer membrane attached centrally to a rigid disk, deforming into an out-of plane shape when subject to force and voltage

Summary

Introduction

As a class of electroactive polymers, dielectric elastomers (DEs) possess a unique attribute: large deformation. In addition to the capability of large deformation, DEs have other intrinsic attributes, such as light weight, high efficiency, low cost, noise free etc., which make them attractive for applications as transducers in artificial muscles, actuators and sensors, energy harvesters, soft robotics, adaptive optics etc.[2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. Most DEs are rubber-like materials and they often involve in time-dependent, dissipative processes, such as conductive relaxation, dielectric relaxation and viscoelastic relaxation.[27,28] Experiments have proved that viscoelasticity can significantly affect the electromechanical behaviors of DEs.[29,30,31,32] To further reveal the viscoelastic effect on the DEs, a lot of efforts have been contributed.[33,34,35,36,37]

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Conclusion