Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Cheol-Hyun Kim
Won-Oh Cho
Research and Development Center,
Chang Am LS Company,
Asan-City,
ChoongChungNam-Do 336-857, South Korea
Research on the applications of magneto-rheological (MR) elastomers in mechanical engineering has greatly expanded, whereas
the performance of MR fluids in tribology has rarely been investigated. In this study, the tribological characteristics of an MR elastomer are identified in order to improve tribological performance
with the activation of a magnetic field. Microscopic changes in
the surface and in the MR particles are investigated. The friction
and wear of an MR elastomer is measured using a pin-on-disc tester under applied and unapplied magnetic fields. In addition, the
linear sliding friction of an MR elastomer with respect to different
velocities and loads is measured using a linear sliding tester.
[DOI: 10.1115/1.4023080]
Keywords: coefficient of friction, wear, Magneto-rheological
(MR) elastomer, magnetic field
Introduction
Journal of Tribology
Magneto-Rheological Elastomer
C 2013 by ASME
Copyright V
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tics. Several experiments are conducted under different test conditions with the existence of magnetic fields and various loads.
A linear sliding tester designed to measure linear sliding friction is shown in Fig. 3. Since some parts of the original tester are
made of steel, it could be affected by a magnetic field during the
test. Thus, there was a possibility that the test results could be
unreliable. Therefore, the tester was re-designed using aluminum,
which is not affected by a magnetic field. The tester consists of a
data acquisition board for data collection, a linear stage, a power
supply, and an electromagnet with a 60 mm in diameter, 60 mm in
height, and a magnetic field strength of 0.2 T.
In the first stage of the test, the surface of the MR elastomer is
observed through a microscope to identify its characteristics, with
and without a magnetic field, before carrying out the friction and
wear test. The friction and wear characteristics using a pin-on-disc
tester are then identified. The pin diameter and length used in the
test are 5 and 30 mm, respectively. Because rubber can easily be
torn by sharp edges, the experiments are conducted with a steel
ball attached to the end of the pin to minimize damage to the surface of the MR elastomer. Table 1 shows the conditions of the
pin-on-disc test according to the existence of a magnetic field; the
other test conditions are the same as in the test using rubber. The
velocity and time duration are fixed at 2.36 mm/s and 2 h, respectively. The load is varied (5, 10, and 15 N).
In the second stage, a linear sliding test is carried out for an MR
elastomer 6 and 15 mm in height and 59.5 mm in diameter. Table 2
shows the conditions of the test. Two test conditions are used: an
applied magnetic field and with no magnetic field. The applied
loads are 2 and 6 N, and the velocities are 1, 10, and 37.5 mm/s.
The sliding distance is fixed at 20 mm.
Table 1
Fig. 2
Pin-on-disc tester
Magnetic
field
Test
number
Load
(N)
Velocity
(mm/s)
Time
(h)
Gauss
(G)
Unapplied
1
2
3
4
5
6
5
10
15
5
10
15
2.36
2.36
2.36
2.36
2.36
2.36
2
2
2
2
2
2
0
0
0
20
20
20
Experiments
Fig. 3
Applied
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Table 2
Magnetic
field
Test
number
Velocity
(mm/s)
Load
(N)
Distance
(mm)
Gauss
(T)
Unapplied
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
1
1
10
10
37.5
37.5
1
1
10
10
37.5
37.5
2
6
2
6
2
6
2
6
2
6
2
6
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.2
Applied
4.
To identify the characteristics of an MR elastomer with a magnetic field, the surface is observed using a microscope. Figures
4(a) and 4(b) are images of the surfaces of the MR elastomer with
no applied magnetic field and with an applied magnetic field,
respectively. The carbonyl iron (CI) particles are likely to gather
due to the presence of a magnetic field (compared to no magnetic
field), which is shown in Fig. 4(b). The gathered CI particles
assume that a resisting force can be applied to the direction of the
magnetic field. The results of the friction and wear characteristics
Journal of Tribology
Fig. 6 Images on the surface of the MR elastomer after the pinon-disc tests: (a) no magnetic field, and (b) applied magnetic
field
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Fig. 8 Comparison of the results between linear sliding friction and acceleration (load of 2 N and velocity of 1 mm/s; Test 7)
against friction is improved for the case of a lower load and applied
magnetic field.
In general, Schallamach waves and the generation of wear particles typically occur in elastomers during a friction and wear test
[14]. These phenomena also occurred in the MR elastomer during
the pin-on-disc test in this study because the base material of the
MR elastomer is a silicon-based material. The generated Schallamach waves and wear particles are shown in Fig. 6. The solid
arrow in Fig. 6(a) shows the direction of rotation. In the figure,
the Schallamach waves and wear particles are marked in front of
the arrow. As shown in Fig. 6(b), the Schallamach wave phenomenon and the generation of wear particles occurred less often
when the stiffness increased with the activation of the magnetic
field.
In the second experiment, a linear sliding test was carried out in
order to investigate the characteristics of linear sliding friction in
an MR elastomer. Figure 7 shows the measured linear sliding friction coefficient for different test conditions, which are described
in Table 2. Figure 7 shows that the friction coefficient at the beginning of the test rapidly increases. The MR elastomer is compressed at the beginning of the test because of the load applied to
its surface, which caused a sudden increase in the coefficient of
friction for the initial state of the test. Tests 7 to 12 are cases with
Fig. 9 Average friction coefficient results from the linear sliding test
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Conclusion
The tribological characteristics of MR elastomers are examined. Magneto-rheological elastomers, based on silicone rubber
mixed with high polymers with two different viscosities and polarity materials, are produced. Friction and wear tests were carried
out to obtain the tribological characteristics under a magnetic
field. Microscopic images of the surface of the MR elastomers
show that CI particles are likely to gather when a magnetic field is
applied. The gathered CI particles can change the property, such
as the modulus of MR elastomers, affecting the friction and wear
characteristics of MR elastomers. The friction and wear characteristics of the elastomer are measured using a pin-on-disc tester. To
examine the performance against friction and wear, the tests are
conducted under an applied magnetic field and with no magnetic
field with three load conditions. The results of the pin-on-disc
tests shows that a smaller load with an applied magnetic field
leads to a decrease of the friction coefficient. In addition, it was
observed that Schallamach waves and wear particles are generated
on the surface of the MR elastomer, especially when no magnetic
field is applied. Schallamach waves are different from the ones in
common elastomers due to the CI particles. It is assumed that the
CI particles affect the elasticity of MR elastomers. Schallamach
waves are not observed when a magnetic field is applied because
the MR elastomer stiffens.
A linear sliding tester was designed and the test was conducted
in order to evaluate the friction and wear characteristics of the
MR elastomer under the applied magnetic field. The results of the
linear sliding test show a lower friction force when a smaller load
and slower velocity are applied. In addition, a stick-slip phenomenon
Journal of Tribology
is detected when measuring linear sliding friction and the stickslip behavior decreases when the magnetic field is activated. The
increased velocity can also diminish the stick-slip effect. Based
on the obtained tribological characteristics, including the stickslip phenomenon, MR elastomers could potentially be applied to
various industrial or automotive systems with further studies
under more realistic conditions. Applications using MR elastomers can be specified to, for example, a controllable pad attached
to the bottom of a robot or clutches with a controllable pad on
them. Further studies need to be conducted under more realistic
conditions.
Acknowledgment
This research was supported by the Ministry of Knowledge
Economy (MKE), Korea, under the Convergence Information
Technology Research Center (CITRC) support program (Grant
No. NIPA-2012-H0401-12-1007) supervised by the National IT
Industry Promotion Agency (NIPA). This research is also supported by the Basic Science Research Program of the National
Research Foundation of Korea (NRF), funded by the Ministry of
Education, Science and Technology of the government of Korea
(Grant No. 2010-0025763). This research was supported by Inha
University.
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