Conducting polymer actuators formed on MWCNT and PEDOT-PSS conductive coatings

•Conductive coatings based on PEDOT-PSS and MWCNT.•PPy-DBS bilayer and trilayer studies.•Conductive coatings PEDOT-PSS/MWCNT ratios affecting the actuator displacement.

To obtain bilayer or trilayer conducting polymer actuators, a conductive coating, such as gold, on a non-conductive flexible polymer layer is required to assure high conductivity for the electrochemical deposition of the conducting polymer. In this study, we focus on the replacement of such metal layer by conductive coatings based on multi-wall carbon nanotubes (MWCNT), poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) doped with poly(4-vinylbenzenesulfonate) (polystyrene sulfonate) (PEDOT-PSS), and mixtures of the two (PEDOT-PSS/MWCNT). The actuator performance of polypyrrole doped with dodecylbenzenesulfonate (PPy-DBS) on these conductive coatings, deposited on poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) films, were investigated using electrochemical experiments. Different PEDOT-PSS/MWCNT ratios in the conductive coating layer deposited with PPy-DBS affected the actuator displacement. The actuator constructed using PPy-DBS on PEDOT-PSS/MWCNT showed cycling stability up to 14,000 cycles at 1 Hz.