Roll Molding of Microchannel Arrays on Al and Cu Sheet Metals: A Method for High Throughput Manufacturing

Abstract

The method of roll molding is proposed as an alternative to compression molding for lowcost, highthroughput manufacturing of metalbased microchannel structures. Elemental aluminumand copperbased microchannel arrays with depths of ∼600 خ¼m and depth:width ratios ≥2:1 were successfully fabricated by roll molding at room temperature. Morphologies of roll molded Al and Cu microchannels were examined in detail. Response of roll molding was characterized by measuring depths of roll molded microchannels as a function of the normal loading force per width. This response of roll molding was further shown to scale with the flow stress of roll molded material. Roll molding offers the potential of fabricating microchannel structures with large footprints in a continuous manner.