Abstract:The electrorheological (ER) fluid, governed by a uniform electric field, will lose the damping ability given by the electric field under the condition of high shear rate load, and cannot meet the demands of the high speed impact load applications. Existing research results show that the parallel components of a non-uniform electric field which has the same direction as the flow of the ER fluid can make ER dampers work with a broader range of higher shear rates. A ring-shaped interdigitated electrodes configuration was designed, which could generate a non-uniform electric field with parallel components. An effective electric field strength value was carried out as the characterization of the non-uniform electric field in the ER fluids working area, and simulations of the influences of geometric parameters of the electrode configurations on the effective electric field strength were done by using COMSOL Multiphysics. The results show that the minimum of effective electric field strengths decreases with the increase of the electrodes layer widths and increases with the increase of insulating layer widths, which can support the electrodes configurations design of a non-uniform field-governed ER damper, and provides reference to other ER applications governed by the same type of electric fields.