Aerosol Jet Printed Sensor on Fibre for Smart and IoT Applications

This paper presents manufacturing of the fully Aerosol jet printed temperature sensors on plastic fibres. Three different materials of the fibres were selected as a substrate for fully printed sensors -100% fluorocarbon and 100% nylon fibre both in diameter of 400 μm and narrow polyimide stripe with the width of 500 μm. A laboratory tightening tool was designed and manufactured to achieve straight and equal tightened fibres ready for the printing process. The interdigital electrodes were designed and printed by nanoparticle conductive inks. The sensitive layer was printed by carbon nanotubes (CNT) ink. The layer was also deposited by Aerosol jet technology. The printed functional structures indicated good sensing properties and might be a future step in the sensor integration for smart devices of internet of things (IoT), smart textiles, wearables or similar applications.