Abstract
This paper discusses an investigation into deformations of rectangular RAINBOWactuators, which are classified as a type of laminated actuator. The actuators consist ofa piezoelectric active layer and a reduced passive layer formed in an elevatedtemperature reduction process. An energy-based Rayleigh–Ritz model is used toapproximate the thermally induced deformations with 23-term polynomials. Due to largeout-of-plane displacements of the RAINBOW actuators after cooling down to roomtemperature, inclusion of geometric nonlinearities in the kinematic relations istaken into consideration. Actuation characteristics of these actuators caused by aquasi-static electric field applied to the piezoelectric layer are also modeled with theRayleigh–Ritz approach. Material nonlinearities in the piezoelectric layer areincluded in the constitutive equation to capture the effects of a strong electric field.Piezoelectrically induced tip deflections of a series of RAINBOW cantilever actuators arecalculated and compared with experiment. With the geometrical and materialnonlinearities taken into account, numerical simulation reveals the computed tipdeflections agree very well with the experimental data. In addition, tip blockingforces representing the load-carrying capability of the RAINBOW actuators areapproximately evaluated by equating the magnitude of force-induced displacementto that of the piezoelectrically induced tip deflection. Again, good agreementbetween numerical results and experiment can be observed in the case of the tipblocking force. This evidently shows that the pertinent nonlinearities have verycrucial effects on the responses and performances of the RAINBOW actuators.
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