The electrorheological(ER) fluid has been used to the ultraprecision polishing of single crystal silicon as new polishing slurry whose properties such as yield stress and particle structure changed with the application of an electric field. In this work, it is aimed to find the effective parameters in the ER fluid on material removal in the polishing system whose structure is similar to that of the simple hydrodynamic bearing. The generated pressure in the gap between a moving wall and a workpiece, as well as the electric field-induced stress of the mixture of ER fluid-abrasives, is evaluated experimentally, and their influence on the polishing of single crystal silicon is analyzed. Moreover, the behavior of abrasive and ER particles is described.