Principle and Experimental Verification of Flexible Caudal Fin Based on Active Torsion Propulsion Mode

The active torsion propulsion mode of a caudal fin,composed of macro fiber composites(MFC)and carbon fiber orthotropic composite material is proposed.The caudal fin is excited by the piezoelectric structure to vibrate flexibly.The work principle is firstly analyzed by finite element method(FEM)and experiments.Then the caudal fin is optimized to increase the torque and improve the streamline,and the added mass effect from the water is discussed in terms of the frequency of the structure.The torsion resonance frequency is around 103 Hz in the air and decreased by 75%to 25 Hz in the water.Finally,the mean thrust is discussed and measured to be 11 mN at900V(Peak to peak)driving voltage.A flexible micro robot is developed and tested.The locomotion velocity and flow velocity is 320mm/s and 268mm/s,respectively.The results of the simulation and experiments indicate that the locomotion of the biomimetic aquatic robot has fast movement characteristics.

Hysteresis and the nonlinear equivalent piezoelectric coefficient of MFCs for actuation

The hysteretic behavior and nonlinearity of the equivalent material coefficient of macro fiber composites（MFC） under staircase input conditions are investigated using the Preisach model.Based on a database of first order reversal curves, formulas are derived to predict the hysteresis of strain output and nonlinearity of the equivalent piezoelectric coefficient of MFCs. Formulae are verified by comparing the predicted strains with the measured strains of three MFC specimens,which are driven by a random sequence of staircase voltage inputs. The coefficients obtained by the formulae and experimentation coincide. Further results indicate that the equivalent piezoelectric strain coefficient depends greatly on the value of drive voltage across the entire input range, and the coefficient is asymmetric across the negative and positive input ranges. Deflection testing of an MFC composite cantilever demonstrates the importance of taking the nonlinearity of the equivalent piezoelectric coefficient into consideration in the application of actuation.

Dynamic responses of a piezoelectric cantilever plate under high-low excitations

In this paper,the nonlinear dynamic responses of a piezoelectric cantilever plate near the first-order and second-order natural frequencies under the action of electromechanical coupling are studied by experiments and finite element(FE)methods.The influence of different excitation frequencies on the dynamical characteristics of piezoelectric cantilever plates is analyzed with the fixed excitation amplitude.First,an experimental setup is built,including a carbon fiber cantilever plate attached to a macro fiber composite(MFC)sheet.Then,the electromechanical coupling excitations are subjected to the plate with different frequencies,which are chosen near the first and second-order natural frequencies of the plate.The piezoelectric cantilever plate has periodical motions under a lower frequency excitation,and the motions of the plate become more complex after another high frequency excitation added in the physical field.The experimental results show that the motion of the piezoelectric cantilever plate changes from stable to unstable with high-low coupled resonant frequencies.At last,the FE study is carried out to compare and verify the experimental results and the effects of isotropic and orthotropic materials on the accuracy of natural frequencies results are also compared.