Transcript Photonic Curing and
Photonic Curing and the PulseForge Toolset
Stan Farnsworth VP Marketing May 2014
NovaCentrix
®
Printed Electronics Manufacturing
Raw Materials Industry product types Ink components; Raw substrates Mfg Materials Inks; Substrates Material Handlers Roll-to-roll; Conveyors Tool Integrators Printers Dryers Inkjet; Screen; Aerosol; Flexo; Gravure; Ovens; Air knives; New Tech Curing Tools Ovens; UV Lamps; Lasers; Pulsed Thermal Processing; New Tech Device/ Application Solar; RFID; Batteries; Transistors; Displays; Packaging; Smart cards Nanoparticles Metalon
®
Novele
™
inks substrates PulseForge
®
tools SimPulse™ thermal simulator
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Quick Profile Initially established in 1999 in Austin, TX Employees: ~40 : Facilities: ~4000m 2 Competencies: Plasma physics, high-power (MW) electronics, nanomaterials, numerical modeling, machine systems design, dispersions and formulations
www.novacentrix.com
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Product Snapshot
PulseForge
® Photonic Curing Tools
Metalon
® Conductive Inks Also: Ag, Ni, Co, others
SimPulse
® Numerical Simulation www.novacentrix.com
What is Photonic Curing?
Photonic Curing – Using carefully timed and controlled flashlamps to heat only the surface and not the entire thickness of the material. Exposure time is usually less than 1 millisecond.
– Allows use of high-temp materials on low-temp substrates.
– Organic and inorganic inks (including ITO, Si) – Polymer, paper, glass
NovaCentrix is the process originator, and holder of key patents.
Pulsed Light
Thin Film/Substrate Interface Thin Film Substrate Distance from Surface www.novacentrix.com
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“Basic” Photonic Curing Pulse: What is it?
Basic pulse shape
Simple ON-OFF cycle.
Can be repeated.
Basic pulse suitable for depositions <10 um
Inkjet Ag (Metalon JS-B25P) @ <1 um Notice sintering after photonic curing.
Before After www.novacentrix.com
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Pulse Shaping: Advanced Pulse Structures
Conventional Pulse
Pulse Shaping
Pulse Shaping: Multiple pulses acting within the thermal equilibrium time of the material
.
• Equivalent energy but composite pulse allows better control of temperature profile.
• Preferred pulse structure for many thicker depositions as well as for drying.
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Advanced Pulse Structures Required
Without pulse shaping, processing screen-printed inks can fail.
With pulse shaping, processing screen-printed inks is optimized.
Skinning and pitting • Optimal surface and curing • Optimized electrical performance.
Delamination Warped substrate www.novacentrix.com
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Innovation: Copper Oxide Reduction Ink
• • • Copper inks are of interest – Cu costs much less than Ag – Cu has 90% of the conductivity of Ag Traditional copper nanoinks are problematic – True Cu inks want to oxidize, especially nanoparticle inks – Stable nanoparticle inks of true Cu are usually expensive, outweighing cost benefits New Approach – Instead of fighting oxidation, begin with particles in their terminal state: fully oxidized.
– Converts to conductive Cu during processing with PulseForge tool.
• • • • • Metalon ICI-021: Water-based Nano copper oxide particles Reduction agent Water and ethylene glycol Sheet resistance ~15 mOhm/sq Very economical pricing www.novacentrix.com
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Copper Oxide Reduction Ink and Pulse Shaping
• • To convert the copper oxide to copper, certain elevated temperature must be reached and sustained long enough for the reaction to complete. The exact required temperature and time are not known
a priori
for a given system: too low or too high will yield poor results.
Pulse Configurations Shaped Pulse (top) Basic Pulse (bottom) Resulting Thermal Simulation (Generated using
SimPulse
) This Basic Pulse creates temperature too hot and too short.
Shaped Pulse creates optimal temperature for optimal time.
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R&D to Production
PulseForge 1200/1300 PulseForge 3200/3300 www.novacentrix.com
• Different chassis • Shared components
– Lamps – Reflector housings – Power supplies – User interface
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Water cooling
Separation of Functions
Power supplies and lamp controllers Cables Lamp housing Material conveyance User interface Controls, work surface www.novacentrix.com
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Configurable Process Width
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Designed for Value and Performance
Throughout the design and development process for the PulseForge 3200 tools, careful thought was given to identifying key design topics. Interviews with external industry leaders as well as internal experts in the NovaCentrix inks and applications teams contributed to design attributes that are embodied in the current tool architecture.
• • • • •
Design Priorities
Safety – – Access interlocks Automatic system operation monitoring Performance – State-of-the-art engineering allows optimization of application processing Economic operation – – – Extremely long lamp lifetimes with quick and tool-free lamp changes No warm-up time required prior to operation Water-cooled for continuous operation at max rated power Ease of operation – – Advanced custom operating system and user interface Process settings can be saved and accessed for future production Ease of integration into Customer’s Quality Management System – – On-board recording of each pulse profile and lamp output can be linked and traced to specific item Process conditions can easily be shared between R&FD and production PulseForge tools www.novacentrix.com
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Thank You
Contact our partners or us directly with questions or for samples processing .
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