A latchable high-pressure composite valve actuator combining paraffin and a low melting point alloy

This work presents a latchable valve microactuator for use in high-pressure environments, for instance deep-sea sampling in missions of long duration. Mounted on a minisubmersible, it can be used in confined spaces, earlier virtually unreachable. However, the device can be used in any high-pressure application where long open and/or closed times are required, and power supply is an issue. The actuator is fabricated using standard batch-processes as photochemical machining, wet etching and lithography. Focus of this work is on the endurance of the actuator to facilitate a bistable valve. The actuator managed to keep a deflected position for almost 50 hours at 1.8 MPa applied pressure, after which the experiment was aborted.