An electrohydrodynamic jet printer with integrated metrology

Abstract

Integrated metrology is critical for quality control and validation of micro-scale additive and subtractive manufacturing processes. However, the current practice in micro-scale additive manufacturing is to manufacture a component on a die and then transfer the die to a separate metrology tool, losing the datum, increasing production time, and also risking contamination. This paper presents a new system that integrates electrohydrodynamic jet printing, an emerging micro-scale additive manufacturing technique, with inline atomic force microscopy for rapid, die-by-die in-line metrology and quality monitoring. The system performs automatic registration of datums and is self-contained for minimal contamination. To validate the effectiveness of the integrated system, performance metrics such as position precision and accuracy and drop volume precision are derived from 50 samples of a 122-drop pattern. These experimental results provide a demonstration of electrohydrodynamic jet printed patterns with completely automated, in situ quality monitoring.