A small wind power generator with Archimedes blades made of polypropylene has been developed for the effective generation of eco-friendly electronic energy. Despite the excellent structural characteristics of the higher performance of an Archimedes blade, its shape is complicated to manufacture, and presents difficulty in guaranteeing mechanical reliability in the outdoor operating environment. Especially, the UV-Light deterioration in a long-term of several years affects the mechanical properties of the polypropylene blade. To evaluate the change of strength depending on the amount of UV-Light irradiation in the outdoor environment, an accelerated UV-Light deterioration test is proposed and conducted using three types of blade materials, such as polypropylene with UV-Resistance material (C₂₀ H₂₅ N₃O) coated and mixed ones. Through the experimental tests, the UV resistant material coating on the blade showed the best properties for long-term exposure to UV light. Based on the test results of property changes, the Archimedes blade was analyzed using a finite element method to predict the reliability of the blade’s underused conditions. As a result of the analysis, the UV degradation resistance of Archimedes blades with UV coating improved by 2.4 times compared to the case without UV coating.

A novel method for the development of a highly sensitive triboelectric sensor based on porous PDMS matrix and carbon black (CB) particles is proposed. The porosity of the PDMS is controlled by using wet sugar particle sizes, and we fabricate a porous PDMS plate with a pore-to-volume ratio of 46%, which has a larger internal contact area compared to a non-pore one. To investigate the sensitive responses of the sensor, two key processes for the deposition of CB particles are conducted. One is the stirring process and another is ultrasonic vibration waving process. Based on the proposed method, a high-performance flat triboelectric sensor is fabricated. By a weight drop test of two different sensors, the amount of out-voltage is changed to approximately 29.1 and 95.1%, respectively. Through this study, we can evaluate that the sensitivity of triboelectric sensors is affected by the deposition method of the CB particles. The proposed flexible triboelectric sensor can be applied to analyze human physical behavior. Also, we believe that it can be applied to measure various physical signals such as contact force or gripping force with small values.

Generally, press molds have thermal and mechanical impact wear during usage. To improve the life of the mold, enhancement of mechanical properties such as abrasion resistance and shockproof capability is required. To solve this, we propose the multi-layered cladding process of functional materials with different mixing ratios. AISI-D2 material, known as cold die steel, was used as base material and AISI-M4 and -H13 powders were used for surface cladding on the base metal for high resistance wear and shockproof capability. Four cases of specimens were prepared to compare mechanical properties after tests. Through this study, a specimen multiple cladded with mixing M4 and H13 powders for middle layer and M4 powder only for top layer showed 80% improvement in shockproof capability. We posit that this method based on multi-layer cladding with a combination of functional metal powders increased mold life.

Recently, many studies have been conducted on the nano-scale fabrication technology using twophoton-absorbed polymerization induced by a femtosecond laser. The nano-stereolithography process has many advantages as a technique for direct fabrication of true three-dimensional shapes in the range over several microns with sub-100 nm resolution, which might be difficult to obtain by using general nano/microscale fabrication technologies. Therefore, two-photon induced nano-stereolithography has been recently recognized as a promising candidate technology to fabricate arbitrary 3D structures with sub-100 nm resolution. Many research works for fabricating novel 3D nano/micro devices using the two-photon nano-stereolithography process, which can be utilized in the NT/BT/IT fields, are rapidly advancing.

Piezoelectric materials are well-utilized for transforming mechanical vibrations into electrical energy that can be stored and used to power a diversity of devices. In this work, these materials have been studied to improve the efficiency of a piezoelectric system, whereby the shape and vibration mode of a piezoelectric module was changed. The basic shape of the piezoelectric module used in this work comprises a width of 10 mm, a length of 30 mm, and a thickness of 0.2 mm. The structural design of the piezoelectric module is optimized using a Taguchi method to increase the corresponding electrical-energy generation. The maximum terminal voltage was defined as a characteristic value to evaluate the optimal design parameters. Through this work, we propose an optimal structure with an eccentric and centric mass; furthermore, the voltage increase of approximately 26% was obtained by comparing a general plate-vibrating piezosystem with an optimal plate-vibrating piezosystem.

We fabricated multi-scale such as macro-, micro-, and multi-scale wrinkles by using repetitive volume dividing (RVD) method and thermal curing process. Also wrinkle surface was modified with coating of a self-assembled monolayer (SAM). We measured the contact angle of each wrinkled surface, and observed the behavior of droplets on sloping surface. Through experimental study, we found out that the contact angle was much higher in case of multi-scale and SAM coated wrinkles. And micro-scale wrinkle showed a high contact angle comparing with that of macro-scale wrinkle. Dynamic behaviors of a water droplet like sliding velocity on diverse wrinkled surfaces were dependent on their static contact angles. These results showed that hydro-dynamic characteristics were changed depending on the wrinkle structure and the material forming the wrinkle. These dynamic characteristics can be utilized in bio-chip, microfluidics, and many others in order to control easily chemical reactivity.

A refrigerator has many components which are made from diverse materials such as metal, polymer, plastic, and rubber. So, it generally requires much time and efforts to build up an analysis model in finite element analysis. In this work, to reduce the computational time and efforts a simplified modeling method was proposed for the analysis of a refrigerator. Occasionally, a stick-slip noise occurs in a refrigerator due to relative slip between shelf and inner-case. When we solve the problem by a FE analysis, we should model the structures with detail for considering the contact conditions; by this reason, too many efforts are consumed in the conventional analysis method. Through this work, we shows the concept of simplifying approach and a good agreement with the results of a real model analysis. And also, the evaluation of the proposed method and the application of contact analysis using the simplified model are discussed.

Wrinkling is a common phenomenon in nature and the shape of a wrinkle can be defined using characteristic dimensions such as pitch, length, amplitude, and density etc. Wrinkle structure can be utilized in various research fields, and especially it has special characteristics when it used in applications of heat transfer; a wrinkly surface has the effect to promote turbulent flow and increasing surface area. However, the generation of wrinkle structures in somewhat regular is not easy. Till now, there are some research works focused on realization of wrinkles in micro scale. However, most of the processes generally requires high precision equipments and high costs, and also there is a limitation to generate the wrinkles in a large area. In this study, we propose a novel method named as a RCO (repetitive contact-and-open) process to fabricate wrinkle structure with low cost and relative easy way. Using the RCO, we fabricated micro-corrugate structures successfully. From the experimental results, we found out the process parameters of RCO, and showed the possibility of RCO to be used in real applications.

A microfin on a heated surface and its effects of the heat transfer has been investigated. The thickness of the fin is about 8 micrometer to allow the flexible up-down motion of the fin. Two-way complete FSI (Fluid-Structure Interaction) method has been applied for the analysis. Firstly, the deformation of a microfin due to the pulsating flow is evaluated using structure analysis. The flow and temperature patterns are predicted by CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) method. At each time step, using the pressure force and temperature distribution from CFD, the deformation of the wing is evaluated by FEM. Also in order to estimate the resonance probability, the natural frequency of the wing structure is calculated by modal analysis. The proposed numerical procedure was validated through experiment using a single fin. Through this work, we show that the increase of 40% in heat transfer capacity using the microfin has been compared with that of flat plate case.

A pair of connectors for transferring torque is widely used in various types of a mechanical system. By the repetition of mechanical contact between a pair of connector, wear occurs easily. This kind of defect sometimes can cause a serious problem of health in case of the connector is used in a refrigerator. In this work, the material combination of connectors was experimentally studied to reduce the amount of wear; for the combination of connectors, various types of engineering materials including polyacetal, polycabonate, stainless steel (STS-304), NiP coated STS-304, and STS-310 were evaluated to check each wear behavior. Also an effective method of wear test was suggested for precise controlling of wear conditions such as contact area, contact force, and relative motion speed. From the test results, it was found out that a pair of polyacetal to STS-304 and STS-310 showed the lowest specific wear rates among other pairs.

Two-photon stereo lithography is recognized as a promising process for the fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) microstructures with 100 ㎚ resolution. Generally, beam-scanning system has been used in the conventional process of two-photon stereo lithography, which is limited to the fabrication of micro-prototypes in small area of several tens micrometers. For the applications to 3D high-functional micro-devices, the fabrication area of the process is required to be enlarged. In this paper, large-area two-photon stereo lithography (L-TPS) employing stage scanning system has been developed. Continuous scanning method is suggested to improve the fabrication speed and parameter study is conducted. An objective lens of high numerical aperture (N.A.) and high strength material were employed in this system. Through this work, 3D microstructures of 600*600* 100 ㎛ were fabricated.

Precise fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) self-standing microstructures on thin glass plates via two-photon induced polymerization (TPP) has been an important issue for innovative 3D nanodevices and microdevices. However, there are still issues remaining to be solved, such as building 3D microstructures on opaque materials via TPP and being able to implant them as functional parts onto practical systems. To settle these issues simply and effectively, we propose a contact print lithography (CPL) method using an ultraviolet (UV)-curable polymer layer. We report some of the possibilities and potential of CPL by presenting our results for transplanting 3D microstructures onto large-area substrates and also our examination of some of the effects of the process parameters on successful transplantation.