Mechanical Consequences of Dynamically Loaded NiTi Wires under Typical Actuator Conditions in Rehabilitation and Neuroscience

In the field of rehabilitation and neuroscience, shape memory alloys play a crucial role as lightweight actuators. Devices are exploiting the shape memory effect by transforming heat into mechanical work. In rehabilitation applications, dynamic loading of the respective device occurs, which in turn influences the mechanical consequences of the phase transforming alloy. Hence in this work, dynamic thermomechanical material behavior of temperature-triggered phase transforming NiTi shape memory alloy (SMA) wires with different chemical compositions and geometries was experimentally investigated. Storage modulus and mechanical loss factor of NiTi alloys at different temperatures and loading frequencies were analyzed under force-controlled conditions. Counterintuitive storage modulus- and loss factor-dependent trends regarding the loading frequency dependency of the mechanical properties on the materials’ composition and geometry were, hence, obtained. It was revealed that loss factors showed a pronounced loading frequency dependency, whereas the storage modulus was not affected. It was shown that force-controlled conditions led to a lower storage modulus than expected. Furthermore, it turned out that a simple empirical relation could capture the characteristic temperature dependency of the storage modulus, which is an important input relation for modeling the rehabilitation device behavior under different dynamic and temperature loading conditions, taking directly into account the material behavior of the shape memory alloy.