Dispenser printed electroluminescent lamps on textiles for smart fabric applications

Abstract

Abstract-Flexible electroluminescent (EL) lamps are fabricated onto woven textiles using a novel dispenser printing process. Dispenser printing utilises pressurised air to deposit ink onto a substrate through a syringe and nozzle. This work demonstrates the first use of this technology to fabricate EL lamps. The luminance of the dispenser printed EL lamps is compared to screen-printed EL lamps, both printed on textile, and also commercial EL lamps on polyurethane film. The dispenser printed lamps are shown to have a 1.5 times higher luminance than the best performing commercially available lamp, and have a comparable performance to the screen-printed lamps.

A Complex Multilayer Screen-Printed Electroluminescent Watch Display on Fabric

“…The results from the EL watch are similar to blue colored commercial EL lamps previously tested [3] that showed a luminance of 20.5cd/m 2 at 200Vpeak/400Hz, while the EL watch demonstrates 21.8cd/m 2 at the same voltage and frequency.…”

“…A series of EL lamps were then printed using a dispenser printer to test whether the bus bar is required around the perimeter of the lamp for the designed sizes. The dispenser printer was used as it's able to quickly produce EL lamp prototypes in simple shapes with different designs [3]. Using this rapid prototyping method avoids the purchase of expensive screens which are not well suited to interim testing.…”

“…EL lamps have been chosen for this device as they offer an entirely printable display technology [1][2][3]. The devices work by forming a capacitor structure with a phosphor in the middle as the emitting layer.…”

E-Textile Technology Review–From Materials to Application

“…They are suitable for achieving large area (> 100 cm 2 ) planar circuits, or for concealing and localizing circuits within a small fabric space (< 10 cm 2 ) [26]. Additive manufacturing processes, such as inkjet printing [34], dispenser printing [35], and screen printing [36], have enabled electronic integration on textiles using electrically conductive inks. These inks contain conductive particles, and a polymer binder that holds the particles together [37].…”

Light-Emitting Textiles: Device Architectures, Working Principles, and Applications

“…Screen printing is the most used deposition technique for ACEL fabrication and it consists of transferring an ink onto a substrate through a mesh, changing the mesh to deposit different patterns. It was demonstrated that dispensing printing can be employed as an alternative deposition technique with comparable performance and with a versatility improvement since the deposition pattern can be changed digitally with a potential reduction of time and costs [33]. ACEL devices were also fabricated on semitransparent textiles (38% light transmission) by using a bottom emission configuration [34].…”