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As a novel candidate of electrorheological (ER) material, core/shell composite particles (PAPMMA) of poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) core and polyaniline (PANI) shell were prepared and adopted as a dispersed phase. PAPMMA particles, obtained by a dispersion polymerization method, were spherical and possessed a monodisperse particle size distribution, in which the PANI shell was introduced on the surface of PMMA via an in-situ polymerization of aniline by adding an oxidant in an aqueous acidic solution. Yield stress of the PAPMMA suspensions under an applied electric field was observed to be increased with a particle size. In addition, monodisperse acrylic microspheres with aniline moiety on the surface were prepared by a seeded emulsion method, and then composite particles possessing chemically bonded PANI shell (PA-PGMA) were prepared via an in-situ polymerization of aniline. Their ER characteristics were also examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carbonyl-iron (CI) based magnetorheological (MR) fluid containing submicron-sized additive particles was prepared. The flow behavior at steady and oscillatory shear modes was investigated by comparing flow properties of CI-mineral oil suspensions without an additive via precise control of magnetic field strength. To enhance the dispersion stability and to examine submicron-sized filler effect for the CI suspensions, organically modified montmorillonite (organoclay) was added to the CI suspensions. In addition, with the precision control of magnetic field strength, we examined the novel features of submicron-sized particle filled CI suspensions, especially under weak magnetic field strengths, in steady shear modes; a temporal decrease of steady shear viscosity in sweeping magnetic field strengths was observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, an electrically controllable anti-lock brake system (ABS) for passenger vehicle is developed by utilizing electrorheological (ER) fluid. A pressure modulator which consists of a cylindrical ER valve and the hydraulic booster is constructed in order to achieve sufficient brake pressure variation during ABS operation. The principal design parameters of the modulator are determined by considering ER properties as well as required braking pressure. After investigating pressure controllability of the modulator, a vehicle model which is integrated with the proposed pressure modulator is formulated to design yaw rate controller. A sliding mode controller is designed to obtain desired yaw rate, and the friction forces between roads and wheels are estimated via the estimator. Braking performances of the proposed ABS under various roads are evaluated through the hardware-in-the-loop-simulation (HILS) and the steering stability during braking operation is demonstrated by undertaking split-μ test. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The electrorheological (ER) fluids exhibit a drastic change in rheological and electrical properties. Among these properties, yield stress is one of the critical evaluation parameters of the performance of ER devices. The published experimental data of yield dependence on the electric field strength and particle volume fraction are inconsistent due to the time dependence of material properties and measuring conditions. In this paper, we present a universal function, descriptive of the normalized yield stress, via scaling of the applied electric field strength. This scaling equation hybridizes both the polarization and conductivity models. Yield stress data for various ER fluids are collapsed onto a single curve for a broad range of electric field strengths, suggesting that the proposed scaling equation is adequate for predicting the ER property. Furthermore, the yield stresses, obtained from two different measuring techniques (static and dynamic methods), were also examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report our experimental results on the electrorheological (ER) characteristics of ER fluids consisting of suspensions of semiconducting polyaniline and copolyaniline particles in silicone oil. Ionic sodium diphenylamine sulfonate and nonionic o-ethoxyaniline were introduced to synthesize copolyanilines, i.e. N-substituted copolyaniline and poly (aniline-co-o-ethoxyaniline), respectively. ER fluids using these particles were compared. ER fluids, which contain the ionic copolymer, showed the highest ER performance among polyaniline and its copolymer systems. This result was interpreted in terms of the conductivities of the particles and their dielectric spectra. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]