Modelling of Viscoelastic Dielectric Elastomers with Deformation Dependent Electric Properties

This work deals with electro-viscoelastic modelling and simulation of dielectric elastomer actuators (DEA), including the case of deformation dependent electromechanical coupling. A large deformation modelling framework is adopted, and specific thermo- dynamically consistent material models are established. The general framework is applied to VHB49 polyacrylic polymers which are commonly used in DEA applications. The effects of viscosity and deformation dependent electric permittivity are studied with regards to the stability behaviour and also in view of predicting experimentally observed electromechanical behaviour using numerical simulations.