Three Dimensional Distribution of Sensitive Field and Stress Field Inversion of Force Sensitive Materials under Constant Current Excitation

• Main Authors: Shuanfeng Zhao, Min Liu, Wei Guo, Chuanwei Zhang
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2018-02-01
• Series: Sensors
• Subjects: three-dimensional force sensor; conductive silicone rubber; tactile sensor
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/18/3/722

Force sensitive conductive composite materials are functional materials which can be used as the sensitive material of force sensors. However, the existing sensors only use one-dimensional electrical properties of force sensitive conductive materials. Even in tactile sensors, the measurement of contact pressure is achieved by large-scale arrays and the units of a large-scale array are also based on the one-dimensional electrical properties of force sensitive materials. The main contribution of this work is to study the three-dimensional electrical properties and the inversion method of three-dimensional stress field of a force sensitive material (conductive rubber), which pushes the application of force sensitive material from one dimensional to three-dimensional. First, the mathematical model of the conductive rubber current field distribution under a constant force is established by the effective medium theory, and the current field distribution model of conductive rubber with different geometry, conductive rubber content and conductive rubber relaxation parameters is deduced. Secondly, the inversion method of the three-dimensional stress field of conductive rubber is established, which provides a theoretical basis for the design of a new tactile sensor, three-dimensional stress field and space force based on force sensitive materials.