Abstract
In this work, strontium ferrite/polyimide composite thin films are fabricated and characterized for micromachining applications. The application of these materials in microelectronics and micromachining dictates the use of different polymers than those previously used for conventional plastic magnets due to fabrication compatibility constraints. The material investigated here consists of magnetically anisotropic strontium ferrite particles suspended in a benzophenone tetracarboxylic dianhydride-oxydianiline/metaphenylene diamine polyimide matrix. Magnetic mechanical, and processability properties of these composites are investigated for a strontium ferrite loading range of 55%-80% by volume. Intrinsic coercivity H/sub ci/ residual magnetic flux density B/sub r/ and maximum energy product (BH)/sub max/ have been determined. For an 80% by-volume concentration loading of ferrite, H/sub ci/ of 318 kA/m B/sub r/, approaching 0.3 T, and (BH)/sub max/ of 11900 T/spl middot/A/m have been achieved. Biaxial Young's modulus and residual stress are determined using a slightly modified in situ load/deflection technique. The biaxial Young's modulus increases with increasing the magnetic powder loading. The materials have been deposited and patterned using two techniques: (1) screen-printing and (2) spin-casting, followed by photolithography. Finally, a simple magnetic microactuator made with those materials has been fabricated and tested, which demonstrates the usefulness of those materials to micromachining.