Mechanics, Vibrations, and Tension Measurement of Thin Webs In Roll-To-Roll Manufacturing for Flexible and Printed Electronics

Dan Feng, Purdue University

Abstract

Roll-to-roll processes provide a low-cost and high-throughput scheme for scalable flexible devices manufacturing. Multiple processes are used in roll-to-roll manufacturing, such as functional printing, evaporation/drying, UV curing, hot embossing, laser/heat annealing, laser ablation, plasma/ chemical growth, and sputtering. These processes change the web temperature field and/ or local properties. In addition, residual stresses by the process and web tension can destabilize the process and lead to wrinkling or undesirable performance of the products. abilize the process and lead to wrinkling or undesirable performance of the products. This dissertation investigates three different multi-physics problems relevant to the roll-toroll processes, which are web thermomechanics, air-coupled web vibrations, and the measuring of nonuniform web tension. First, a mathematical model for predicting the in-plane temperature and heat induced stress distributions in a flexible, axially moving web under arbitrary shape of heat flux is presented. The computational approach is validated on experiments performed on moving paper and PET webs with infrared laser heating source. Second, a closed-form, semi-analytical, universal hydrodynamic functions is developed to accurately predict the lowest symmetric and anti-symmetric transverse frequency responses for any uniaxially tensioned web of arbitrary material and aspect ratio used in roll-to-roll processes with the surrounding air acting as distributed added mass. Experimental validation is carried out by using pointwise laser measurements of acoustically excited webs with different pre-tensions, web materials, and aspect ratios. Finally, we develop and test a non-contact resonance method and a gentle contact stiffness mapping method based on the first principles mechanical models of a tensioned plate to accurately measure the average web tension and its linear variation for a wide range of web properties, web path, web tension, measurement configurations, and environmental conditions. The two methods are crossvalidated on a stationary test stand and the non-contact resonance method is used to study the web tension distribution within a commercial roll-to-roll system.

Degree

Ph.D.

Advisors

Raman, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Alternative Energy|Condensed matter physics|Energy|Food Science|Industrial engineering|Materials science|Mathematics|Medicine|Optics|Physics|Polymer chemistry|Thermodynamics

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