Piezoelectric Actuators Characterization

This paper describes a system to drive piezoelectric actuators over more than one decade of voltages and one octave of frequencies, in order to perform high-speed complex impedance characterization at a user chosen voltage excitation level. This characterization provides information about electrical and mechanical characteristics of the device under tests. An electronic board was developed and components were chosen in order to provide high voltages. Optimized algorithms were implemented into a DSP to insure high accuracy measurements of impedance and phase of the load and to minimize process time.