• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.1345-1345
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• 2007

• Macromolecular Research
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• v.17 no.12
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• pp.1032-1038
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• 2009

A polypyrrole (PPy)/alumina composite filler prepared via in-situ polymerization of pyrrole on alumina particles was incorporated into $Nafion^{(R)}$ to improve the performance of ionic polymer-metal composite (IPMC) actuators. The IPMCs with the pristine PPy without alumina support did not show bending displacements superior to that of the bare Nafion-based IPMC, except at a high PPy content of 4 wt%. This result was attributed to the low redox efficiency of the PPy alone in the IPMC and may have also been related to the modulus of the IPMC. However, at the optimized filler contents, the cyclic displacement of the IPMCs bearing the PPy/alumina filler was 2.2 times larger than that of the bare Nafion-based IPMC under an applied AC potential of 3 Vat 1 Hz. Even under a low AC potential of 1.5 V at 1 Hz, the displacement of the PPy/alumina-based IPMCs was a viable level of performance for actuator applications and was 2.7 times higher than that of the conventional Nafion-based IPMC. The generated blocking force was also improved with the PPy/aiumina composite filler. The greatly enhanced performance and the low-voltage-operational characteristic of the IPMCs bearing the PPy/alumina filler were attributed to the synergic effects of the neighboring alumina moiety near the PPy moiety involving electrochemical redox reactions.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.223-231
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• 2019

The properties of Electroactive Polymer (EAP) materials are attracting the attention of engineers and scientists from many different disciplines. From the point-of-view of robotics, Ionic Polymer Metal Composites (IPMC) belong to the most developed group of the EAP class. To allow effective design of IPMC-actuated mechanisms with large induced strains, it is necessary to have adequate analytical tools for predicting the behavior of IPMC actuators as well as simulating their response as part of prototyping methodologies. This paper presents a novel IPMC motor construction. To simulate the bending behavior that is the dominant phenomenon of motor movement process, a nonlinear model is used. To accomplish the motor design, the IPMC model was identified via a series of experiments. In the proposed model, the curvature output and current transient fields accurately track the measured responses, which is verified by measurements. In this research, a three-dimensional Finite Element Method (FEM) model of the IPMC motor, composed of IPMC actuators, simultaneously determines the mechanical and electrical characteristics of the device and achieves reliable analysis results. The principle of the proposed drive and the output signals are illustrated in this paper. The proposed modelling approach can be used to design a variety of controllers and motors for effective micro-robotic applications, where soft and complex motion are required.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2005.11a
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• pp.723-726
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• 2005

The two major obstacles in the application of IPMC to flapping actuators operated in the air are solvent loss and actuation force. In this paper, solvent loss of various IPMCs made of Nafion$^{TM}$117(183$\mu$m thickness) has been experimentally investigated to find out the best combination of cation and solvent for minimal solvent loss in IPMCs and higher actuation force. For this purpose. experiments for the internal solvent loss measurement of IMPCs have been conducted for various combinations of cation and solvent. From the experiments, it was found that heavy water showed improvement in the operating time up to more than two minutes. in the tip force measurement of IPMCs, it was found that smaller and thicker IPMCs produced larger tip forces. However, the shorter IPMCs generated reduced actuation displacements and created flapping motion with decreased natural frequency. For the design of flapping device actuated by 5mm wide, 10mm long, 0.2mm thick IPMCs were used in the stacked form. Since the actuation force is a few gram-force, we stacked five IPMCs to improve actuation force. To amply the actuation force, rack-and-pin ion type hinge was used for the flapping device and insect (Cicadidae) wing was attached to the stacked IPMC actuator. In the flapping test, the device could generate flapping angle of 15$^{\circ}$ at 6Hz excitation by 2.5 voltage square wave input.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2013.05a
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• pp.1621-1622
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• 2013