Investigating, implementing and testing solutions to eliminate the drift in the resistance of ceramic thick film printed heaters in order to ensure a stable operation.

Datec Coating Inc.是“一家加拿大技术公司，专门提供加热解决方案，使制造商能够优化其产品的性能”。他们的核心业务在于其获得专利的独特厚膜技术，该技术的加工温度低于400°C，可以将加热元件直接打印到各种材料上，包括低熔点材料(如铝)和热膨胀不匹配会与其他工艺(如云母)严重匹配的材料，从而为客户提供独特的设计灵活性，以适应广泛的应用和产品。虽然Datec厚膜工艺有许多可能的新应用，但该技术受到其电阻加热器电阻漂移的限制。虽然这种漂移对他们目前的业务线基本上是有利的，但可能会对Datec的一些潜在客户的应用程序造成不利影响。在与Datec最近完成的Engage项目中，对Datec打印加热器的电阻漂移的性质进行了彻底的调查。通过X射线衍射仪、拉曼光谱和热重分析对Datec印刷电阻器进行的结构和化学分析，导致了一种理论的发展，该理论涉及亚稳过渡组分的存在及其在大气湿度下的水化。一旦确定了电阻漂移的原因，就对可能的解决方案进行了初步调查，并提出了有限数量的可行解决方案。对建议的前两个解决方案的初步结果显示，这些想法导致了电阻器结构和性能的显著改善。这个持续项目的目标现在是实施所建议的各种解决方案，调查它们的有效性，以及这些解决方案可以轻松地集成到Datec的制造过程中。Engage和当前Engage plus项目的成功都是为了巩固现有的合作，以便共同探索和开发在更广泛和非常有前景的功能陶瓷印刷领域快速增长的业务发展机会。

Datec Coating Inc. is "a Canadian technology company that specializes in heating solutions that enablemanufacturers to optimize the performance of their products". Their core business lies around their patentedunique thick film technology involving a processing temperature under 400°C that enables printing heatingelements directly onto a wide range of materials, including low melting point materials, such as aluminum, andmaterials where thermal expansion mismatch would be a severe issue with other processes, such as mica,giving its customers a unique design flexibility for a wide-range of application and products. While manypossible new applications of Datec thick film process are envisioned, the technology is limited by drifts in theresistance of their resistive heaters. While mostly benign for their present line of business, this drift, could bedetrimental to some of Datec's prospective customers' applications. During the Engage project with Datec thathas been recently completed, a thorough investigation on the nature of the resistance drift in Datec's printedheater was performed. Structural and chemical analysis of Datec's printed resistors, performed by X-raydiffractometry, Raman spectroscopy, and thermo-gravimetric analysis, lead to the development of a theoryinvolving the presence of metastable transition components and their hydration when exposed to atmospherichumidity. Once the cause of the resistance drift was identified, preliminary investigations on possible solutionswere performed and a limited number of viable solutions proposed. Initial results on the first two solutionsproposed revealed that these ideas lead to appreciable improvements in the resistor structure and performances.The objective of this continuing project is now to implement the various solutions proposed, investigate theirefficacy, as well as the ease with which the solutions could be integrated into Datec's manufacturing process.The success of both the Engage and the present Engage PLUS project is meant to consolidate the existingcollaboration in order to explore and develop together the rapidly rising opportunities for business developmentin the more general and very promising field of printing of functional ceramics.