ABRICATION OF SILICON RUBBER - FERROFLUID COMPOSITE ACTUATOR

Abstract

Magnetic nanoparticles in carrier liquid show normal liquid-like behavior. These ferrouids show the smart property of controlling viscosity with a magnetic eld. Many industries have full potential application for this ferrouid, including the medical. The application of ferrouid at nano-micro size structure gives improvement in efficiency and functionality. This research has focused on the development of micro-size transducers using ferrouid, which will replace the existing mechanical system. These transducers will have key features of compact size, quick response time, and low operational cost. The micropump design was tested with latex elastomer, synthetic rubber, and silicone rubber as a diaphragm. This research has successfully developed a silicone rubber ferrouid composite cantilever at the micro-scale. Every sample's deection under various magnetic elds is compared. Experiments reveal that the anisotropic sample yields the largest deection. A low magnetic eld of 15mT is used to test cantilevers with a diameter of 0.4mm and a length of up to 10 mm. The highest deection we measured at 44 mT magnetic eld was 82.5 degrees. An isotropic sample exhibits a greater range of amplitude in dynamic testing. These cantilevers have two uses: as actuators and as sensors.