Changes in Mechanical Quality Factors with Canted Polarization for Piezoelectric Actuators

Less heat generation and device reliability are essential for high-power piezoelectric actuators. With angled polarization, materials with strong shear properties show enhanced piezoelectricity, with increased elastic loss. This study aims to understand the changes of dielectric, elastic and piezoelectric loss factors with respect to the polarization orientation, and further utilize to design materials for the high-power devices. A new characterization method is proposed for better accuracy in the analysis. 1% Nb doped Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 (PZT) are prepared and the loss parameters are analyzed with the effective parameters. For k31 vibration mode, maximum quality factor could be obtained with canted polarization in Tetragonal structure under antiresonance drive. For k15 vibration mode, maximum quality factor could be obtained with canted polarization in both Rhombohedral and MPB structure under resonance drive. The enhanced quality factor could be considered for the future high-power applications.