Experimental Investigation of an MSM controlled Reluctance Actuator

In a wide range of mechatronic applications, electromagnets generate forces. Their merits are in providing contactless forces, as well as the ease of control and manufacturing. However, generation of constant forces leads to heat build-up due to Ohmic losses. The temperature increase is especially undesirable in precision engineering applications, as it can negatively affect positioning accuracy. To address this issue, an actuator concept was developed with little to no power loss in constant operation and a compact design, while maintaining contactless force generation. The concept employs excitation by permanent magnets (PM) and control by variable magnetization of magnetic shape memory alloys (MSM). The development process was presented previously. In this paper, experimental investigations for key features of this actuator design are addressed. These include multi-stable stroke adjustment of the MSM-sticks, achievable reluctance force variation and performance of the positioning system for MSM stick adjustment.