Chain formation mechanism of magnetic particles in magnetorheological elastomers during pre-structure

Current research on magnetic particles in magnetorheological elastomers (MRE) mainly focuses on the effect of particle distribution and arrangement on the mechanical properties. However, there are few studies on the chain formation mechanism of magnetic particles in MRE. In order to solve the above problems, we proposed a numerical simulation method to study the movement of magnetic particles in MRE. First, the force of the magnetic particles under the magnetic field was analyzed, and the magnetic particle movement model was established. Further, the change of the movement parameters of the particles during the contact process was obtained, including the changes of magnetic force, viscous force, displacement, and velocity. According to the analysis results, the critical angle of attraction and repulsion was determined, and the simulation results were verified by experiments. Finally, the effect of magnetic field strength, volume fraction and particle size on the chain formation of magnetic particles was simulated, it was found that the strength of the external magnetic field affected the efficiency of particle chain formation, and the volume fraction and particle size affected the morphology of the particle chain formation.