A preliminary discourse on tunable rolling resistance of electrorheological fluid reinforced polymer composites

Rolling resistance contributes to 6-10% of the overall fuel consumption of vehicles. In order to enable future smart tire technology, rolling resistance needs to be responsible for environmental conditions. Materials with smart property are fabricated by composing smart filler.;In this research, a laboratory-scale pendulum-acoustic emission device is adopted to evaluate the rolling resistance coefficients and normalized damping for selected materials. At first, fibrous electrospun membranes (polyvinylidene fluoride, polycaprolactone and nylon 6) and different substrates were tested. As substrates, asphalt and rubber consistently give rise to the higher rolling resistance and the shorter damping time, while electrospun membranes produce the lower rolling resistance and the longer damping time. Electrospun polymer fabrics appeared to provide a tuning opportunity for changing the rolling resistance. From the test results, there has consistently positive correlation between elastic modulus and rolling resistance. For these four types of polymer electrospun membrane, the mechanical properties are studied.;Electrorheological fluid (ERF) is well known as solid-fluid transform under the effect of electrical voltage. It is used as a smart filler to reinforce silicon rubber and electrospun polymer membrane. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), Atomic Force Micrograph (AFM) and Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDX) are utilized to examine the incorporation of ERF in the silicon rubber and surface morphology. For the ERF reinforced silicon rubber composite, we prepared a series of composites with different ERF/rubber ratio and vulcanization voltages. The effect of different ERF concentrations is investigated. The obtained smart ERF reinforced silicone rubber composites show tunable coefficients of rolling resistance against external electric field. We also study the mechanical properties and surface characteristics of smart composites under different vulcanized conditions. Two classical rubber constitutive models: Mooney-Rivlin model and Ogden model are adopted to understand the mechanical behavior of ERF reinforced rubber. The interaction of mechanical properties and rolling resistance of the studied smart composite system is discussed.;For the ERF reinforced polymer electrospun membranes, we propose a co-electrospinning technology to prepare electrorheological fluid (ERF)/fabrics membranes composite. A wood-pendulum acoustic-emission device is used to evaluate the rolling resistance of ERF/fabrics membranes composite. Two different co-electrospinning smart composite systems are studied: ERF/PVDF and ERF/PCL. The tunable rolling resistance behavior of this smart composite system is studied through testing under different external electrical field. The surface morphology is also examined to further understand its interaction between rolling resistance.