Finite Element Analysis of a tube’s waste Rubber to be used as a Diaphragm in Pressure Switch that is being built from available cheap Materials

Abstract

A piece of rubber, from an old truck tube, is cut into three specimens to be tested in universal tensile tester. Unfortunately, the tensile tester does not have an ability to measure the change in thickness with the change in length i.e. The tester only reads the applied force with the deformation. Therefore, to get enough accurate data for the Workbench simulation, the first readings in the test was selected to be compared with their peers in the library of Workbench 2022. Two materials (Elastomer Yoeh and Elastomer Neoh-Hookean) in the library seem to follow the same behavior as the real rubber piece. Based on the properties of these two materials, the diameter of the diaphragm was selected to be about 25.55 mm and the geometry of this diaphragm is drawn using Catia R17 Software with the same thickness as an old tube, then the model was imported to Workbench 2022 where a three dimensional mathematical models were built using the properties of the two materials i.e. each material property has its own three dimensional mathematical model. Based on the obtained results from the two Workbench modeling, an experimental real model was built where diaphragm is cut from that old truck tube and the mechanical part of pressure switch is built using very cheap and available materials. Water pressure is applied to the new real model with the same amounts used in Workbench 2022. The deformation of the diaphragm is measured for each pressure value and be compared with the results previously obtained in Workbench. It is found that the most material approaching the real rubber is Elastomer Yoeh with some differences.  The elastomer Yoeh  material can be used in theoretical analysis with Workbench and the results can be followed in practical applications. The real deformation in practice is about 1.5 times from the Elastomer Yoeh deformation computed with Workbench.