It has a second ceramic layer sandwiching the substrate. One variation on the bender actuator is called the trimorph. Typical characteristics include deflection of several tenths of a millimeter and forces up to 1 N. One end of the actuator is usually fixed, so motion gets converted to a bending movement.īender actuators can be designed to have a range of possible forces and motions, and they are well-suited for use in pneumatic valves. This piece is also joined all along one side to a conductive substrate. Piezo elements can be crafted into several types of actuators, depending on what the needs are: disc transducers, bender actuators or piezo stacks.īender actuators are rectangular with a piece of piezo ceramic material that has been rendered conductive on both surfaces. In applications that need to be extremely energy-efficient, it is even possible to recover the charging energy when the drive is reset and then use it again for the next charging operation. Electrical power is calculated as voltage × current, so the power is zero if no more current flows. Current only flows while the capacitor is charging, and flow drops to zero when charging is complete. In electrical terms, a piezo element is a capacitor consisting of two electrically conductive plates and the ceramic piezo material between them acting as a dielectric. This is one advantage of piezoelectric valves and drives. These shape changes can be harnessed to power a drive and be created using almost zero power. Using strong electric fields, engineers can give some ceramics piezoelectric properties that make them change shape when a voltage is applied. They found some materials, usually ceramics with conductive surfaces, convert electrical energy into mechanical energy and vice-versa. The piezoelectric effect (from the Greek word for “pressing”) was discovered in 1880 by the brothers Jacques and Pierre Curie, the latter being the husband of Marie Curie.

Piezo electric lighter gold bars