Large area roll-to-roll screen printing of electrically conductive circuitries

Abstract

In this study, the roll-to-roll equipment was used to print up to 1000 mm web width and 400mm repeat length. Two screen types, 275 and 325 inch-per-line (ipl) mesh, were studied. The 275 inch-per-line mesh plate has 39 μm opening, 53 μm non-opening, and 83 μm thick and the 325 ipl mesh plate has 30 μm opening, 48 μm non-opening, and 65 μm thick. These screen mesh specifications indicate that the 325 screen mesh is meant for printing relatively finer and thinner patterns, compared to the 275 screen mesh. Printing using the studied screens was conducted using lenticular test patterns and RFID patterns. The remaining printing parameters such as squeegee, attack angle, web speed, substrate, ink, and drying temperature, were kept same for both screens. The study found that the investigated high-count-mesh screen can print fine patterns up to 108 μm and the studied low-count-mesh screen can print coarser patterns of above 150 μm with relatively thicker patterns of 10 μm. The printing uniformity was also characterized by measuring the electrical resistance values. The results show that the electrical resistance values have deviation of below 10% from the average resistance value.