Modeling of dielectric viscoelastomers with application to electromechanical instabilities

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

10-1-2016

Abstract

Soft dielectrics are electrically-insulating elastomeric materials, which are capable of large deformation and electrical polarization, and are used as smart transducers for converting between mechanical and electrical energy. While much theoretical and computational modeling effort has gone into describing the ideal, time-independent behavior of these materials, viscoelasticity is a crucial component of the observed mechanical response and hence has a significant effect on electromechanical actuation. In this paper, we report on a constitutive theory and numerical modeling capability for dielectric viscoelastomers, able to describe electromechanical coupling, large-deformations, large-stretch chain-locking, and a time-dependent mechanical response. Our approach is calibrated to the widely-used soft dielectric VHB 4910, and the finite-element implementation of the model is used to study the role of viscoelasticity in instabilities in soft dielectrics, namely (1) the pull-in instability, (2) electrocreasing, (3) electrocavitation, and (4) wrinkling of a pretensioned three-dimensional diaphragm actuator. Our results show that viscoelastic effects delay the onset of instability under monotonic electrical loading and can even suppress instabilities under cyclic loading. Furthermore, quantitative agreement is obtained between experimentally measured and numerically simulated instability thresholds. Our finite-element implementation will be useful as a modeling platform for further study of electromechanical instabilities and for harnessing them in design and is provided as online supplemental material to aid other researchers in the field.

Identifier

84974679330 (Scopus)

Publication Title

Journal of the Mechanics and Physics of Solids

External Full Text Location

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmps.2016.05.033

ISSN

00225096

First Page

213

Last Page

229

Volume

95

Grant

1463121

Fund Ref

National Science Foundation

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS