Smaller, faster, smarter - three keywords that summarise the trends in the high-tech machine building industry well. This holds for various industries:
- Complex machines in the semiconductor industry, that manufacture integrated circuits or 'chips' for devices like tablets, smartphones and notebooks.
- Machines in the solar industry, that manufacture solar panels to convert sunlight into electrical energy as a decentral replacement of traditional power plants.
- Analytical equipment within and outside chemical laboratories, that analyses or diagnoses the chemical composition or other physical properties of samples taken from a process flow.
- Machines in food and beverage industry where several nutritional compounds or flavourings are added, mixed and processed to obtain the desired food.
Measurement and control of gas and liquid flows
The common part where Bronkhorst and machine builders operate is that part of the machine where gas and liquid flows have to be measured or controlled. Machines for chips or solar panel manufacturing make use of chemical vapour deposition steps for coating application or diffusion doping, where organometallic vapours have to be generated and supplied to (silicon) supports onto which a solid deposition has to take place.
In analytical devices such as various chromatography equipment (e.g. GC or HPLC) and mass spectrometers (MS), very low gas or liquid flows carry the to-be-analysed chemical compounds along with them.
In food machines, liquid additives such as colours, aromas and flavours have to be supplied accurately, to control the exact food composition. For dosing flavours to your sweets the ultrasonic waves technology could be a solution. Read about it in our previous blog
‘Ultrasonic waves technology’.
Miniaturisation of high-tech machines
The miniaturisation trend is observed in many places. Small components need fewer quantities of raw materials, in production as well as in (chemicals) use. Customers of high-tech machines would like to have their equipment as compact as possible. Machines have to be smaller in size, as floor area is expensive, especially in cleanrooms - the 'natural' habitat of machines that manufacture solar panels and chips.
Compactness is also needed for online on-site analysis and monitoring - so outside the lab. Under those conditions, test equipment is preferably handy-sized. One would like to know on-site and in real-time what is going on - in order to react proactively instead of reactively, and to reduce the time to bring measuring samples to the lab. It is part of the online quality control: as a safeguard, but also to save on raw materials.
Removing the housings of standard products, and putting the components on a manifold gives a desired saving of space. Placing the input and output lines and connections on positions that are suitable for the customer often leads to a unique and compact solution. Compact devices with a combination of several analyses on a small surface area increase speed and reduce costs.