Bistable Antagonistic Dielectric Elastomer Actuators for Binary Robotics and Mechatronics

Chouinard, Patrick; Plante, Jean‐Sébastien

doi:10.1109/tmech.2011.2135862

Cited by 71 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…This absence of deformation is not the case for soft elastomers and indeed their change in thickness with an applied voltage has been exploited to create electric field-induced actuators. [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] Very large actuation strains can be achieved using soft elastomer dielectrics but they must first be biaxially stretched. It is now understood that pre-straining is necessary to forestall an electromechanical instability mode associated with dielectric thinning identified by Stark and Garton.…”

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confidence: 99%

The thickness and stretch dependence of the electrical breakdown strength of an acrylic dielectric elastomer

Huang

Shian

Diebold

et al. 2012

Applied Physics Letters

143

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The performance of dielectric elastomer actuators is limited by electrical breakdown. Attempts to measure this are confounded by the voltage-induced thinning of the elastomer. A test configuration is introduced that avoids this problem: A thin sheet of elastomer is stretched, crossed-wire electrodes are attached, and then embedded in a stiff polymer. The applied electric field at breakdown, EB, is found to depend on both the deformed thickness, h, and the stretch applied, λ. For the acrylic elastomer investigated, the breakdown field scales as EB = 51 h − 0.25 λ 0.63. The test configuration allows multiple individual tests to be made on the same sheet of elastomer.

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confidence: 99%

The thickness and stretch dependence of the electrical breakdown strength of an acrylic dielectric elastomer

Huang

Shian

Diebold

et al. 2012

Applied Physics Letters

143

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“…This method has been applied to a cylindrical DEA configuration [37], which has shown a large actuation stroke. While several mechanisms using an antagonistic configuration of DEAs have been developed [38], [39], our concept uses elastic hinges for supporting the folding of the structure and as an additional design parameter. The actuator output characteristics, such as the angular displacement and the torque, vary with the material properties or the geometry of the hinge.…”

Section: A Actuator Conceptmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Foldable Antagonistic Actuator

Shintake

Rosset

Schubert

et al. 2015

IEEE/ASME Trans. Mechatron.

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Abstract-We report on an actuator based on dielectric elastomers that is capable of antagonistic actuation and passive folding. This actuator enables foldability in robots with simple structures. Unlike other antagonistic dielectric elastomer devices, our concept uses elastic hinges to allow the folding of the structure, which also provides an additional design parameter. To validate the actuator concept through a specific application test, a foldable elevon actuator with outline size of 70 mm × 130 mm is developed with angular displacement range and torque specifications matched to a 400-mm wingspan micro-air vehicle (MAV) of mass 130 g. A closed-form analytical model of the actuator is constructed, which was used to guide the actuator design. The actuator consists of 125-μm-thick silicone membranes as the dielectric elastomers, 0.2-mm-thick fiberglass plate as the frame structure, and 50-μm-thick polyimide as the elastic hinge. We measured voltage-controllable angular displacement up to ±26• and torque of 2720 mN · mm at 5 kV, with good agreement between the model and the measured data. Two elevon actuators are integrated into the MAV, which was successfully flown, with the foldable actuators providing stable and well-controlled flight. The controllability was quantitatively evaluated by calculating the correlation between the control signal and the MAV motion, with a correlation in roll axis of over 0.7 measured during the flights, illustrating the high performance of this foldable actuator.Index Terms-Antagonistic, artificial muscle, dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs), foldable actuator, micro air vehicle.

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“…To increase the maximum stroke, negative springs, or bistable elements are often seen in DEA designs. For example, [2] utilized rubber bands as an off-the-centre mechanism in a diamond DEA and achieved over 100% stroke. Based on the same concept, [3] achieved a 170% stroke on a single cone DEA.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%