Design and manufacturing of high precision roll-to-roll multi-layer printing machine : measurement and experiment

Abstract

In 2008, a prototype machine demonstrating the application of roll-to-roll technology in micro-contact printing was developed. In this research, the prototype machine was upgraded by designing and machining a device that could fabricate a flat stamp with significantly less variance. The print roll wrapping system was reconfigured in order to capture the stamp with uniform force and good alignment. The motion control for the print roller and impression roller was also improved. In addition multi-layer printing with the updated machine was tested. This thesis focuses on the general design of the updated system and the measurement of key components of the systems as well as the print quality. Results demonstrate that the flat stamp can achieve the flatness of ±16 [micro]m with thickness of 1194 [micro]m; that the wrapping process can guarantee a print roller roundness error in the 20 [micro]m range; that the distortion of the print using the updated system is approximately 3.8. The multi-layer printing test did not achieve acceptable results owing to a lack of proper control of the machine. However, initial trials, achieved alignment errors of 1017 [micro]m along the printing direction and 113 [micro]m across the printing direction.