Piezoelectric fans consisting of a piezoelectric layer and an elastic metallayer were prepared by epoxy bonding and a coupled flexible wing was formed by apair of carbon fibre reinforced plastic wing spars and polymer skin attached totwo piezoelectric fans. Two sinusoidal voltages with phase differences were thenused to drive the coupled piezoelectric fans. High speed digital cameras wereused to characterize the two degree of freedom (DOF) motion of the wing andthese results were compared to finite element model of the wing and the coupledpiezoelectric fans. It has been observed that the phase delay between thedriving voltages applied to the coupled piezoelectric fans plays an importantrole in the control of the flapping and twisting motions of the wing and thisset-up has the potential for application to the control of flapping wings formicro aerial vehicles. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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