Capillary Forces in Microassembly

This book explains the use of capillary forces as a gripping principle in microscale assembly. Clearly written and well organized, the text integrates physical concepts at the microscale level with practical applications in micromanipulation. Readers get a review of gripping principles and the elements needed to model capillary forces. Moreover, the book provides a description of the simulation and experimental tests developed to study design parameters. A detailed case study concerning the pick and place of balls in a watch's ball bearing helps readers see how theoretical concepts are applied in practice. Researchers and engineers in the fields of precision assembly, surface science, microfluidics, and micromechanics will find this a highly useful reference for microassembly system design and analysis.

Covers an interdisciplinary field, between the surface sciences fundamental aspects and more production and assembly oriented issues The developed methodology includes an exhaustive literature review, models and simulations, experimental validation of the models and of the proposed gripping principle, within the framework of a watch bearing assembly case study Provides an exhaustive basis to understand, model (analytically and numerically), and design grippers based on capillary forces Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Klappentext
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Capillary Forces in Microassembly* discusses the use of capillary forces as a gripping principle in microscale assembly. Clearly written and well-organized, this text brings together physical concepts at the microscale with practical applications in micromanipulation. Throughout this work, the reader will find a review of the existing gripping principles, elements to model capillary forces as well as descriptions of the simulation and experimental test bench developed to study the design parameters. Using well-known concepts from surface science (such as surface tension, capillary effects, wettability, and contact angles) as inputs to mechanical models, the amount of effort required to handle micro-components is predicted. These developments are then applied in a case study concerning the pick and place of balls in a watch ball bearing.

Researchers and engineers involved in micromanipulation and precision assembly will find this a highly useful reference for microassembly system design and analysis.

Inhalt
Microassembly Specificities.- From Conventional Assembly to Microassembly.- Classification of Forces Acting in the Microworld.- Handling Principles for Microassembly.- Conclusions.- Modeling and Simulation of Capillary Forces.- First Set of Parameters.- State of the Art on the Capillary Force Models at Equilibrium.- Static Simulation at Constant Volume of Liquid.- Comparisons Between the Capillary Force Models.- Example 1: Application to the Modeling of a Microgripper for Watch Bearings.- Second Set of Parameters.- Limits of the Static Simulation.- Approaching Contact Distance, Rupture Criteria, and Volume Repartition After Separation.- Example 2: Numerical Implementation of the Proposed Models.- Conclusions of the Theoretical Study of Capillary Forces.- Experimental Aspects.- Test Bed and Characterization.- Results.- Example 3: Application to the Watch Bearing.- Example 4: Application to the Watch Bearing.- Conclusions.- General Conclusions and Perspectives.- Conclusions and Perspectives.- Appendices.- Modeling Complements.- Geometry Complements.- Comparison Between Both Approaches.- Symbols.