Embedding and Contacting of Electrical Components for Hybrid Additive Manufacturing

Abstract

Integrating electrical functionality during additive manufacturing (AM) is a promising new field of application. In this article, different concepts for combining an extrusion-based AM process called 3-D dispensing (3DD) with the embedding of electrical components are developed and compared. Based on criteria, such as resulting surface quality or overall accuracy, the best strategy among six different approaches is identified. To further validate and confirm the choice, long-term reliability tests [humidity and thermal shock testing (TST)] with a particular focus on the electrical contacts between the printed tracks and the embedded electronic components have been conducted. It was shown that the embedding strategy and the cavity design have no influence on the long-term properties of the printed electrical tracks. Finally, an acceleration sensor is embedded in a 3-D housing to prove real use-case applicability and to show the improvements identified in the previous study.