Electrorheological Fluid Shock Absorber

A review of the state-of-the-art of ER technology has shown that the existing designs for shock absorbers have never been developed for large mass and high acceleration parameters which are critical for the Navy application. The main objective of this proposal is to implement the latest achievements in the understanding of the mechanism of ER phenomena together with the latest enhanced designs of advancing shock absorber technology in developing the ER fluid, active device, and inexpensive high voltage generator and control circuitry which will provide optimum shock dampening for Navy equipment (mass from 20 to 1000 lbs. acceleration in the vicinity of 10 g's and duration time from 0.2s to 0.04s). The proposed design of ER shock absorber for ship mounted equipment will contain a number of innovations, such as squeezing ER flow, shallow bypass groove recessed in the central part of the inner tube in order to divert some fluid past the piston at the beginning, annular labyrinth seals on the piston heads in order to increase the pressure drop across the piston head, and integral pressurized accumulators in order to compensate for the fluid displacement and to provide the force necessary to-return the piston rod to the extended position.