The present contribution aims towards a thermo-electro-mechanical characterization of dielectric elastomer actuators (DEA) based on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS). To this end, an experimental setup is proposed in order to evaluate the PDMS-based DEA behavior under the influence of various rates of mechanical loading, different ambient temperatures, and varying values of an applied electric voltage. To obtain mechanical, electro-mechanical and thermo-mechanical experimental data, the passive behavior of the material, as well as the material's response when electrically activated, was tested. The influence of the solid electrode on the dielectric layer's surface was also examined. Moreover, this work focuses on the production of such DEA, the experimental setup and the interpretation and evaluation of the obtained mechanical hysteresis loops. Finite element modeling approaches were used in order to model the passive and the electro-mechanically active response of the material. A comparison between experimental and simulation results was performed.
Keywords: FEM simulation; dielectric elastomer actuators; mechanical hysteresis; screen printing; silicone; solid state electrode; thermal behavior; voltage dependencies.