A Novel Miniaturized Electromagnetically Excited Vibrating Membrane Rheometer

Viscosity and mass density sensing utilizing vibrating microstructures has become an important field of research in recent years. Often clamped-free cantilevers operating in their fundamental normal mode with costly optical read-out mechanisms are employed for this purpose. In this contribution an electromagnetically excited clamped-clamped structure made of a polyester based foil with an inductive read-out is investigated. Several vibrational modes can be excited this way. The relatively large amplitudes and its low operation frequency makes these devices suitable for the rheological analysis of more complex liquids like suspensions or emulsions.