MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF AN ER FLUID IN TENSILE, COMPRESSION AND OSCILLATORY SQUEEZE TESTS

Abstract

In this work, the mechanical properties of an anhydrous electrorheological fluid made of carbonaceous particles dispersed in silicone oil were determined in tensile, compression and oscillatory squeeze tests. The mechanical tests were carried out on a Mechanical Testling Machine and the device developed for measuring the ER properties was composed of two parallel steel electrodes between which the ER fluid was placed. The mechanical properties were measured for different DC electric field strengths, velocity and initial gap between the electrodes, and the ERF was tested in two different ways: (a) the fluid was placed between the electrodes (configuration 1) and (b) the electrodes were immersed inside the ERF (configuration 2). The results showed that the ER fluid is more resistant to compression than to tensile, and that the shape of the tensile stress-strain curve and the tensile strength varies with the electric field strength and the initial gap between the electrodes. The compressive stress increased with the increase of the electric field strength and with the decrease of the gap size and upper electrode velocity. In oscillatory test, for both configurations 1 and 2, increasing the oscillation frequency f and the number of cycles N produced a decrease of the damping performance of the ER fluid. Besides this, the damping force of each cycle in oscillatory tests increased with N. The electric field also played an important role on the shape of the hysteresis loop (stress as a function of fluid strain) for both configurations.