This study investigated effects of energy levels, pulse durations, and pulse frequencies during an IPL (Intense Pulsed Light) sintering process on surface morphology and resistance of screen-printed Ag patterns on PET substrates. Surface characteristics, including primary profile (Pa), roughness (Ra), thickness, and sheet resistance, were measured before and after sintering. At fixed energy levels (13.18, 32.96, and 46.14 kW), increasing pulse counts (2, 5, and 7) at 6 ms durations significantly increased Pa and thickness, while Ra was not changed. In contrast, higher pulse counts (4, 10, and 14) at 3 ms durations improved surface roughness by reducing Ra. Statistical analysis (Paired T-test) confirmed these results. Sheet resistance analysis showed that lower pulse counts at 6 ms caused greater variability in resistance, stabilizing with higher counts. At 3 ms, surface resistance decreased with higher pulse counts, showing reduced variability. These results suggest that adjusting pulse conditions and counts during the sintering process can optimize both electrical properties and uniformity. Additionally, morphological changes before and after sintering indicated that these adjustments might influence upper-layer printability in multilayer printing. The study highlights the importance of considering both functional and morphological characteristics during sintering for optimized production of printed electronic devices.

SFT, which has a high glass fiber content, is one of the effective methods to replace metal and secure weight reduction and price competitiveness. This study evaluated the effect of glass fiber shape on mechanical properties in injection molding by fabricating SFT with a glass fiber content of 60%. Three types of SFTs were manufactured by adding round glass fibers of Φ7 μm and Φ10 μm and flat glass fibers of 27 × 10 μm. DOE (Design of Experiment) conducts to confirm the change in tensile strength due to changes in significant injection conditions. As a result of the experiment, Φ7 μm SFT and flat SFT have similar tensile strength and Φ10 μm SFT showed the lowest tensile strength value. As for the standard deviation of strength value, the Φ7 μm SFT had the largest standard deviation, and the Φ10 μm SFT showed the slightest change in the injection conditions. In flat SFT, it confirms that the tensile strength increased as the molding temperature increased. The fracture surface observes using SEM. It founds that the tensile strength lowers due to the small glass fiber density and many pullouts at the fracture surface of Φ10 μm with weak strength.

This paper presents the development of a magneto-optical encoder for higher precision and smaller size. In general, optical encoders can have very high precision based on the position information of the slate, while their sizes tend to be larger due to the presence of complex and large components, such as an optical module. In contrast, magnetic encoders have exactly the opposite characteristics, i.e., small size and low precision. In order to achieve encoder features encompassing the advantages of both optical and magnetic encoders, i.e., high precision and small size, we designed a magneto-optical encoder and developed a method to detect absolute position, by compensating for the error of the hall sensor using the linear table compensation method. The performance of the magneto-optical encoder was evaluated through an experimental testbed.