Development of a novel high bandwidth piezo-hydraulic actuator for a miniature variable swept wing

Piezoelectric hydraulic actuators, instead of electromagnetic actuators, have a wide application prospect in the field of aerospace due to the merits of light weight, compact structure, non-magnetic interference, etc. Many researches have been devoted to boosting output powers of actuators with the help of large-scale piezoelectric stacks. However, the existing actuator operates at a relatively low frequency, limiting the output power improvement and the application. In this work, a high bandwidth piezo-hydraulic actuator (PHA) is proposed based on a resonant active valve piezoelectric pump with sandwich bending transducers (SBTs). The configuration and principle of the PHA are presented and analyzed. A tested setup of the PHA is established, and the maximum output velocity and thrust are measured to be 30.5 mm/s and 53.2 N under 1.6 kHz, and the output power reaches up to 294 mW under the load of 30 N. In addition, a variable swept wing (VSW) driven by the PHA is studied. The composition and deformation process of the PHA-Based VSW are discussed; the dynamic model of the PHA-Based VSW is derived; the tested results indicate that the maximum angular velocity and torque of the PHA-Based VSW are 1.135 rad/s and 1.701 N.m, and the swept angle range is 15.9 degrees similar to 64.1 degrees

Automated summary

This study proposes a high bandwidth piezo-hydraulic actuator (PHA) based on a resonant active valve piezoelectric pump with sandwich bending transducers (SBTs), which has a wide application prospect. The performance of the PHA is validated through the establishment of a test setup. Additionally, the composition, deformation process, and dynamic model of a variable swept wing (VSW) driven by the PHA are investigated.