Effect of Flow Rate, Excitation Level and Solids Content on the Time Response in an Electro-Rheological Valve

Diverse regimes of the fast time response of an electro-rheological fluid are iden tified in a presentation of experimental results which show the effects of the application of step and DC biased sine wave excitations to a series of set flows in one valve. The form of pressure response is complex and depends to some extent on the rate of flow and applied electric field magnitude. Some frequency domain behaviour is related to the step wave performance. Apart from their value as a foundation study for a new area of rheology, the results are important to the rapidly developing sub ject of flexibly operated smart machines and as an aid in target setting to developers of the hydraulic semi-conductors on which some of them are based.