Thermal characterization of passive piezoelectric actuators

In this paper a workflow for thermal characterization and automatic modeling of passive piezoelectric actuators of prismatic shape is presented. Aim of this work is to generate finite element models of the thermal behaviour of piezoelectric actuators without destroying the actuators. For this purpose an experimental setup was developed, as well as a characterization workflow. The advantage of the workflow lies in the speed of characterization through direct comparison of measurement results with a metamodel and automated finite element model generation for many different actuators that vary in size and shape. The method is exemplarily presented on a PZT stack actuator.