Dispensing in µl Range for Telecommunications Engineering

In cus­tomer-spe­cif­ic dis­pens­ing tests in the preeflow tech­ni­cal cen­ter, the imple­men­ta­tion of a ful­ly auto­mat­ic pro­duc­tion of opti­cal fibers, by using preeflow 2‑component dis­pensers, was test­ed. More pre­cise­ly, the tests focused on the bond­ing of opti­cal fibers in a con­nec­tor. The cus­tomer’s require­ments were: A repeat­able appli­ca­tion of 5 µl of a two-com­po­nent mate­r­i­al in a mix­ing ratio (vol­u­met­ric) of 8.5:1. Using an eco-DUO330. The mate­r­i­al to be dosed is the epoxy adhe­sive EPO-TEK353ND. A two-com­po­nent, high-tem­per­a­ture epoxy spe­cial­ly devel­oped for semi­con­duc­tor, hybrid, fiberop­tic and med­ical appli­ca­tions.  The mate­r­i­al has already proven itself in many appli­ca­tions worldwide.

The spe­cial chal­lenge in dis­pens­ing the adhe­sive is the repeat­able dos­ing and pre­cise inter­ac­tion of all com­po­nents for an exact mix­ing ratio to ensure per­fect curing.

The opti­cal fibers used in telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions engi­neer­ing require the high­est qual­i­ty stan­dards. This begins, among oth­er things, with the bond­ing of the con­nec­tors. The preeflow cus­tomer’s prod­ucts are used wher­ev­er data must be trans­mit­ted quick­ly, reli­ably and absolute­ly error-free. For exam­ple, in the com­mu­ni­ca­tion of audio sys­tems in the auto­mo­tive sec­tor, for high data trans­fer rates in com­put­er net­works or for long-dis­tance trans­mis­sion across the Atlantic. In order to meet the increas­ing­ly strin­gent qual­i­ty require­ments result­ing from ever larg­er data vol­umes and short­er trans­fer times and to achieve the required pro­duc­tion quan­ti­ties, the con­nec­tors and the opti­cal fibers must be bond­ed in an auto­mat­ed process in the future.

Until now, the 2‑component epoxy resin from EPO-TEK has been applied man­u­al­ly. A very com­plex and error prone process. To be able to apply the adhe­sive by hand using a syringe, it must be mixed and filled pre­cise­ly in advance. The desired pre­ci­sion of both the mix­ing ratio and the appli­ca­tion of the min­i­mum amount of adhe­sive is sim­ply not achiev­able in the man­u­al process. In addi­tion, due to the pre-mixed car­tridges, high resid­ual amounts of mate­r­i­al are some­times produced.

The tests at preeflow showed that the required qual­i­ty stan­dards are more than met when imple­ment­ing the dos­ing process with the eco-DUO330 2‑component dis­penser. The vol­u­met­ric dis­penser was con­vinc­ing in terms of repeata­bil­i­ty, ease of ser­vice and, above all, process reli­a­bil­i­ty. The ful­ly auto­mat­ic pro­duc­tion line is cur­rent­ly being planned.