Making Flexure Actuators with Flexible PCBs

[@AndrewOrtman]

man, pcbway's manufacturing engineers must have a stroke every time you send them an order ;P

[@CarlBugeja]

haha they love my work i promise but I cannot imagine them hand mounting all those stiffeners

[@peterevenhuis2663]

I think they like the out of routine projects.

[@PCBWay]

@@CarlBugeja Bingo

[@jorsanflo]

​@@PCBWaySuch a great company

[@renegadethesandwing02050]

id love too see what the engineers actually need to do to get it right

[@luisdelgado5710]

Please try to build a Braile cell, that is a perfect project, it requires miniature actuators. I worked in a project like this for blind people, and the braile cell technology was too expensive, it was a German technology using high voltage, but if you manage to make it work for active braile cell, that will change the life for many people. The prototype we made was like a cellphone using this active braile cells. Great work by the way!!

[@1personithink]

He tried to make a digital display earlier and it didn't work.

[@06howea1]

Do it do it

[@1personithink]

@@06howea1 yes

[@ANKUR884488]

We would love to provide necessary financial support.

[@multiplysixbynine]

What if you flipped the concept around? Integrate the PCB coil into the movable part and move the permanent magnet to the underlying substrate. That way the flexure doesn’t have to support the weight of the magnet or keep it from flying away. Alternatively, perhaps try adding some iron to the movable part and have the flexure provide a restoring force to spring back from the underlying PCB coil when turned off. In any case, I think the permanent magnets are the most troublesome component of these assemblies.

[@BreakingTaps]

Super cool! Spiral flexures are a fun rabbit hole to fall down, although not without their quirks (as you discovered heh). Neat stuff!

[@PCBWay]

caught you here

[@u0000-u2x]

1:06 the fact that we live in a time where you cna design this at home and order it to be delivered to your doorstep is amazing.

[@shashidharybhat]

I think you can use the actuation as a means of switching between bistable configurations. Right now the motion is linear and is dependent on the flexibility of the pcb

[@hamjudo]

Excellent idea! There are some interesting bistable mechanisms that use materials that aren't normally considered flexible. If the range of motion is entirely within the elastic range of the stiff material, then the device can last millions of cycles.

[@Martin-pb7ts]

As someone who loves tech but is not an engineer it is a real pleasure to see a good engineer do a research project like this. Thanks, I really enjoyed it.

[@karthick86c]

6:41 This is exactly how DLP projectors work! Thanks for this video. I love compliant mechanisms!.

[@PCBWay]

Good job, Carl!

[@robertfurr4678]

PCBWay and Altium are single handedly carrying this man's career

[@BenKDesigns]

KEEP MAKING STUFF! Yours are some of the most unique and interesting applications for PCB design I've ever seen. I love every design, and learn a TON in the process of watching. Good stuff.

[@pathfinderpolska]

I was blind by accident but I got my sight back and one of the many things I missed while being blind was the internet. Make a screen with a density close to 600x400 coils in this technology so that you can touch it and feel the contours of the "displayed" image. It would make life easier for the blind 😉

[@DoubsGaming]

I don't know why but I can see this being a super futuristic button. A system that pops it out then you can press it like a button. Say you want to turn on a light. It doesn't pop the button out untill it's pluged it. Once plugged in you can push it and the magnetic field can be used to register a button press. I wonder if you could also use it as a n analog button.

[@johnhopkins6731]

Fascinating exploration of thin actuators. Im impressed you can get those designs mfg so completely at pcbway.

[@AppliedProcrastination]

Great work, Carl! I love this so much. The triple-flap designs are so incredibly well designed and satisfying to watch 😍

[@PCBWay]

caught you here

[@IndoorGeek]

Wow, your creativity knows no bounds! Thanks for the shoutout!

[@Crushonius]

flip dot or maybe even a split flap display with your unique brand of genius could be absolutely gamechanging i know the split flap display is a far fetch but a flipdot display should be possible definitely a challenge but i think very doable

[@alexmipego]

Very cool! I've had a breakthrough on something I believe it's huge, and that's almost what I needed! May find a way to use your version for the testing phase!

[@CarlBugeja]

Thanks! You can send me an email for more info

[@UmbraAtrox_]

The G in Bugeja stands for Genius. Your videos are jawdropping every time.

[@Sailingon]

You could fix the magnet and make the coil out of flexible pcb so it moves instead of the weight of the magnet

[@ShadowDrakken]

0:52 at least 4 of these flexure bearing are just Sharingan XD

[@X19-x5f]

This is very impressive Engineering work. Well done!

[@OriginalMorningStar]

Welcome to the Laminatrix! 😆 Nice work dude, that double-sided gatefold design you've figured out is a bit special. I'm visibly impressed.

[@kyivstarnet7806]

The very best application of this tech is Braille display for blind people. You'd deserve prize for that.

[@LettoOG]

Very neat! I wonder if this could be applied to a scrolling braile display or similar.

[@katharinahengesbach7533]

Wow, you are genius! And you have improved your pronunciation since last video!

[@Dartheomus]

I love your preservation! Nice work!

[@skeleton_craftGaming]

I was already subscribed to you. But this did get me to look at your channel again so whatever you did you did it right!

[@tobiacremona4340]

Dude you might have got the start of a cool keyboard there: To mitigate the interactions between adjacent magbets try putting the magnets with opposing poles next one another (Nup, Ndow). Then build a keyboard array, if you keep the magnets up with a constant coil voltage you can then monitor the change in the coil current when a magnet is pressed, boom you got a frictionless keyboard.

[@Jolllypop]

This would be really cool for something like a vr sleeve around your arms like if something touches it in game to give you some pressure in that area

[@divyanshsrivastava7312]

Damn, very kewl, while watching the vid I realised you could use these actuators for some sort of Brail Device... All the best

[@jeromecharbonnier6226]

You also could use them for input. Make them spring loaded, build like the flaps and as you push, read the output.

[@mustafadut8430]

Carl, you are interested in a very interesting private field. As an engineer, I love following your work. I have two suggestions. - Play with frequency values. - Continue the winding in more than one layer while placing the coil on the pcb. For example, let's say that all 8 layers are coiled. I think this will reduce the overheating problem a bit.

[@roboman2444]

I like the idea of cheap, "haptic" button pads for electronics projects. Buttons that push back just ever so slightly. Like navigating a menu, the button could "push back" when you reach the end of the list.

[@Barnaclebeard]

This has no relevance to my life but I have been watching every video with great interest.

[@holdenhodgdon3756]

In my basic understanding of magnets and circuits, I feel like you should see a change in voltage as pressure is applied to a flexed pad. If I am right, and the sensitivity of what you are using to read the voltage is refined sufficiently, then this could have applications as a minute load cell. Like low pressure environments / suction sensors or powder fill machines in pharma manufacturing.

[@livdbest2942]

Great work Carl !! Very informative video as always 👍👍

[@nikilragav]

The flap thing is basically how DLP works, except it's electrostatic and tiny (MEMS). Electrostatic might make sense here too with a big boost converter

[@andrewgreenwood9676]

Braille display immediately came to mind.

[@maheen-]

Bro will definitely be an inventor in the near future.

[@Notfound4747]

I am watching your progress and mannn it's so nice to see every time you upload

[@HeyBirt]

If the mechanical bit you are moving can be made to be bistable, i.e. latch into one of two positions, you would only need to power the actuator in either polarity to switch it. A polarized screen covering the visible display in combination of a polarized reflective coating on the articulated element might result in the element being visible in one position and invisible in the other. A variation of the flip dot display where the moving element might not need to actually move very much at all.

[@no0ne000]

If you used all electromagnets instead of permanent magnets you'd destroy the circuits a lot less since they'd only interact with each other when on. Also, I believe this technology (with refinement) has applications in biological valve replacement. Out of curiosity, could you create a flexible tube that would contract in a wave sequence to pump fluids?

[@yushengli]

It is similar technology used in Mobile phone Camera module. You can search VCM which drives Lens to certain postion for autofocus function.

[@woj95]

That actuators would work nicely as braille "display". I can imagine small device with camera, and OCR that translates what you pointing at

[@secondengineer9814]

Maybe you could make a very small diaphragm pump?

[@devrim-oguz]

This man is singlehandedly inventing new devices

[@nonoDIY]

So many ideas where you can use this to, thank you very interesting and out of the box

[@estwmk699]

i can't find any word to describe ur work evrytime u amaze us by what u do .... keep up your projects very amazing and not boring

[@Ziraya0]

If you had a system of flextures that you glue to a moving piece, you could have a bistable actuator. You'd just need the flextures to attach to something that compresses them slightly from their rest position, so that deflected in or out is stable, but in the middle is not. I need a thing in my life that indicates whether the current time is inside a specific period, but it needs to consume essentially no power most of the time. I could use a bistable version of this to shift an indicator pin up and down, so it's either sticking out or hidden. You could use a series of this indicator to create a progress "bar" or a binary readout, but simple state indicators like "is it between 3 and 7pm on a weekday" or "is my server online". If you could detect the flexture being pushed to the other stable state, then this could even be interactive, maybe a minimalist work timer where you push the pin in to start the timer and it pops back up at the end. This could be handled in a lot of ways, detecting it through the coil would just be cool.

[@ghetek]

How about filling the housing with oil, putting the assembly in a waterproof flexible bladder and using this actuator as a way of generating pressure waves underwater for communication.

[@nonchip]

i think your galvanometer idea would've benefited from a more traditional cross-gimballing situation (think 2 thin tabs between halfcircles flexing around X, then a circle, then 2 thin tabs in Y) instead of a linearly expanding spring. or do the same trick as most directional pads on controllers and just put a bump in the middle under it to force it being tilted.

[@u0000-u2x]

6:48 would be really cool for big art installations

[@avocadoarms358]

Mad another video, can’t get enough my dude👌🏽👌🏽👌🏽

[@udhayakumara4033]

Can you make a ribbon tweeter with flexible pcb?

[@folkfook]

The PCB strength is not as good as metal, but actually you show quite good results. Pros of flexures: Frictionless guiding, quite good on spring linearity for controlling. Cons of flexures: Deflection of the beams usually about 1/10 of the length to prevent yield, so the moving distance will be limited.

[@l.f.velasco]

So cool! I'm wondering if you could replace the magnet for another coil in order to make it even simpler to manufacture... Or if it'd get far too hot. It would allow it to get thinner and lighter, which would make it worthless for haptical feedback, but better for visual applications, I think.

[@shivaargula4735]

What about a bistable mechanism? So when force is applied it'll naturally pop into the new stable position instead of wobbling as much.

[@DasIllu]

Built with precision positioning rather than force and travel in mind this could still be very useful. Maybe for enhancing laser distance measurement and so on.

[@garfieldnate]

This could be really great for something like the machines that display physical Braille for reading computer screens.

[@neroe23]

High acceleration, low resonance frequency mini haptic actuators are hard to find right now. I work with them every day and your design is atypical with the coil under the magnet and not around it. Most devices use the Lorentz force for a constant force regardless of the magnet displacement. The suspension is the hardest part to get right, the second hardest is the magnetic circuit, good luck !

[@Jandodev]

This is so cool! I just got a power core 3d printer EDM cutter I wanted to dive down this flexure hole too!

[@peter360adventures9]

Awesome. Diaphragm pumps is what I see a purpose for.

[@mattmoreira210]

Have you heard of speaker spiders? They exist to hold the voicecoil centered throughout the whole excursion, much like what you want to do with the magnets here.

[@PeterJKeogh]

Amazing work as always, so impressive! Maybe to solve the magnet problem you could oppose two coils? (So no magnets would be needed)

[@augusto_lisboa]

Great work man, IF you can 'miniaturize' it to the point of 0,6mm magnet, you can do a suitable "braile e-reader"

[@ScriptCoded]

Love your videos! It'd be cool to see you make a "proper" PCB speaker with these boards

[@Adam-ru3km]

Can you nest different size discs inside one another on the same panel to create a more dynamic array?

[@pypes84]

You could pull a "magic 8 ball" and enclose the display in a thin container of very opaque liquid, then all the actuators have to do is press themselves against the glass to create a high contrast mechanical display.

[@nonsquid]

If you used your multi-coil pad with a piece of steel instead of a magnet, then you could use the flex unit as a sensor that would proportionally couple the center driven coil to the sensor coils proportionally to the force applied. This would be a good low volume flow sensor.

[@PauloDutra]

Would be nice to try the galvo idea again, maybw using 2 actuators at 90°

[@virgilanti]

It's probably already been suggested, but have you tried fixing the magnets firmly and having the coil as the moving part? You can power the coil via copper on the arms of the flexure. You then should have far less mass to move, and with the magnets fixed, you wouldn't get the problem of the magnets tearing the thin flexure arms apart. Am I missing something here?

[@rich1051414]

This could work for that tactile guide for the visually impared that 'Stuff Made Here' made. I think the video is called "See in complete darkness with touch"

[@ulwur]

What about using an opposing coil instead of the magnet? Would solve the actuaors sticking to its neighbours problem

[@bkuker]

Can you create a bistable flexture so it takes no current to leave the button popped out? Might be hard using flat pcb material.

[@nikrantasa8693]

bro made every mangekio sharingan designee

[@sumguysr]

This could probably make a great braille display for people with visual impairments. Currently the commercial braille displays you can buy cost more than $100 per character.

[@MithunKalan]

use it for precision lens focus

[@googacct]

Maybe you could use the flexures as a micropositioner for an STM.

[@maksimmuruev423]

Interesting buttons.. I think they can have great application in gamepads. giving gamer feedback on button press, and heating ist and issue because will be quite short period of usage.

[@aedan2354]

I want to use this system to move the wing instead of the servo motor for my small plane. Thank you for your help. Or make a video of it as an idea. thank you please!!!.❤🙏

[@aquilux-vids]

Thought: with the possibility of routing power through the flexture arms couldn't you improve performance by replacing the magnet with a second coil?

[@THCMusicBlog]

Yes build larger ones! Imagine flexures used as engine pistons?

[@mungewell]

Can a display be created by 'breaking' total internal reflection. Have a illuminated substrate infrobt, and when you magnet mechanisn touches rear it causes light to leak/be reflected at that location...

[@jsalsman]

Can the haptic use provide sense information too?

[@adolphtrudeau]

Ideas: 1. self-moving popup books or christmas cards 2. a USB interface that locks when something is written

[@zanequillarts9050]

Are they quick and precise enough to replace a laser galvanometer for diy lasershow or even laser Video?

[@ejrupp9555]

Instead of a spiral use something between a J and a U with longer to the outside ring radiating inward. Or even a W where the middle hump is not connected to the outer ring. The shorter length is glued to the magnet. So say you had 8 segments radiating to the center ... you would have 8 glue points. This would allow the flexure to be below the magnet and would constrain it more centrally and have a more consistent level and minimize the size further. Or if you bent on a spiral make entirely underneath the magnet and just confine the center. Basically invert what you have in the thumb nail ... instead of the 4 points connected to an outer ring, bring them all underneath and to the center.

[@asidesigner8542]

If they can be used as powerful speakers, it would be insanely 👍

[@JesusIsreal72]

This project makes me think that you could use a bunch of these flexible actuators like mechanical leaves like when blown upon by wind, they binder moving back and forth they could create a current that could be stored in a battery Bank giving you more power conversion then a fan style wind turbine.. or you could make each of these into a little fan that could generate current financial wind coming across them.. namaste..

[@zenengineer5803]

How small can you make these? I wonder about a miniature cheap braille display, though getting the magnets in there and not letting them destroy each other might be difficult. You might not even need too much displacement as fingers are very sensitive. Then again I don't know how much demand there's for braille displays now with text to speech being more available.

[@KonuralpBalcik]

It would be more beneficial for the future if you work on generating electricity with simple oscillation.

[@axelduartesalgado4077]

Wow, your work is amazing. A few months ago I was thinking of doing something similar to design a small clock that tells the time in Braille. Will using this technique be efficient?

[@CyanoCobalt]

He is mastering the micro robotics.

[@nobodynoone2500]

How much would enough flaps for a 5x5m "display" cost? Asking for a friend. ;-P

[@ikemkrueger]

I suggest to merge speakers with the structure of MEMS like motion sensors.

[@ClosestNearUtopia]

Next time instead of wasting area and give the project dept with printed plastic, use a second pcb with just a hole and a coil around it. Solder it on the “base” pcb, and no plastic needed, a second or even a tirth coil could be added, improving your design. Making optimal use of all space while maintaining a housing.

[@gordoncouger9648]

If using smaller weaker magnets allows you to make a smaller actuator, the blind are a ready market for a Braille actuator. About 10 years ago I corresponded wot someone making a Braille display using solenoids to make pins stick up. A smaller version of this using this technology would use less current and cost a lot less to build. Just thinking, multilayer actuator driving plastic pins might reduce the magnetic interference. enough to make a finger-sized Braille display.

[@rxbbdoesmusicsometimes]

this would be perfect for a bass driver in a pair of headphones, like how the skull candy crushers work.

[@reastle1307]

you are a genius