Shear Thickening Fluid Impregnated Foam Composites for Vibration Control and Impact Protection (2013)

Highly concentrated suspensions of silica particles present shear thickening properties, shifting from a low to a high viscosity state, instantly and reversibly at a critical shear rate. Their viscosity increases by up to 3 orders of magnitude, changing from a honey-like liquid to a brittle solid material. This sharp rise in viscosity is associated with a large absorption of energy that can be used in damping applications. These shear thickening fluids (STF) are among the few passive materials that can simultaneously bring both an increase in damping and in stiffness properties. In mechanical design, this leads potentially to a weight reduction of the overall system. This thesis work is aimed to develop and test a composite material solution for vibration control and impact protection, using STF as the damping element. A main challenge was to overcome the fact that STF are liquid at rest, and very sensitive to their environment. The proposed damping material was therefore constituted of foam impregnated with STF and encapsulated with silicone (STF/foam). A comparison of properties with other damping materials such as Smactane®was emphasized along the thesis. Storage and processing conditions of STF constituted of highly concentrated suspensions were shown to affect their rheological properties similarly to other sensitive parameters such as particle concentration. Rigorous processing methods were thus required to produce STF with defined and stable rheological properties. The use of sonication was preferred to disperse the aggregates of particles in concentrated colloidal suspensions due to the packing of the dry powder. Contact with air or humidity deteriorates the shear thickening properties of STF. Storage of STF in a freezer at −24 ◦C or under nitrogen prevents this. The use of a physical barrier to air and humidity such as silicone to protect STF is also shown to greatly reduce the ageing problem. The energy dissipated during a cyclic strain cycle was used as a measure of the damping property of the STF, and compared to that of other materials. It was measured with dynamic rheological measurements performed on suspensions with variations of particle concentration, size and test frequency. STF were shown to dissipate a large amount of energy during their transition, which increases with the increase of frequency and particle concentration and decrease with the increase of particle size. In specific cases of large strain amplitude, they potentially dissipate more energy than viscoelastic materials such as rubber. An open cell melamine resin foam was used as a lightweight scaffold to provide a three dimensional structure to the STF. The foam distributes the load and locally shears the STF. The shape of the foam is easily adjustable. To impregnate the foam with the STF, a system similar to vacuum infusion was used. The foam was placed under vacuum in a mold and the STF heated at 70 ◦C to reduce its viscosity and shear thickening properties was sucked in the foam with the depressurization. The STF/foam systems were then encapsulated in silicone to protect the STF/foam damping pads from contamination and avoid outgassing. During compression tests at low frequencies and large deformations, we demonstrated that STF could be activated in this type of structure, with mechanical properties comparable to those of a viscous honey-like fluid at rest and silicone when the STF is in the solid state. The same behavior was observed during impact solicitations. STF/foam presents a very low coefficient of restitution and absorbs the shock wave associated with impacts. Shock tests done separately confirm the shock absorption properties of STF/foam even if the STF is not activated. The combination of mechanical and damping properties of the foam/STF systems remain lower than for very high performance damping materials like Smactane®. The reasons are their low mechanical compression and shear properties at rest and the need to overcome a threshold strain or stress to activate the STF. However, the large dissimilarity between the states before and after the transition makes these materials interesting for impact or large strain amplitude applications such as sole for running shoes or several space structures.