Fabrication of a rotary carbon nanotube bearing test apparatus
Carbon Nanotubes (CNTs) are attractive elements for bearings in MicroElectro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS), because their structure comprises nested shells with no bonding and sub-nanometre spacing between them, enabling relative motion with low friction and wear. A reliable bearing technology is critic...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
| Published: |
IOP Publishing
2017
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/106188 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2167-9860 |
| Summary: | Carbon Nanotubes (CNTs) are attractive elements for bearings in MicroElectro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS), because their structure comprises nested shells with no bonding and sub-nanometre spacing between them, enabling relative motion with low friction and wear. A reliable bearing technology is critical to bringing rotating MEMS machines from laboratory demonstrations to common use. We report here the
design and fabrication of a test rotor, a testing apparatus and testing attempts, and integration of CNTs with MEMS. The device improves on existing CNT bearing demonstrators by establishing a vertical bearing orientation (enabling superior rotor balance and speed, and drive mechanism placement flexibility) and a manufacturable process (employing CNTs grown in place by chemical vapour deposition (CVD)). The main outstanding challenge to demonstrating rotation is available CVD CNT quality. |
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