Customers increasingly expect products that are smaller, have improved functionality and reliability and cost less. Miniaturisation and integration of mechanical, sensing and control functions within confined spaces is becoming an important trend in designing new products in industries such as automotive, biomedical, pharmaceutical and telecommunications. In micromanufacture often manual assembly becomes unfeasible due to the small size of the products. As a result microassembly is becoming a sector of strategic importance in high labour cost areas due to the specific needs of automated...

Micro-assembly is a key enabling technology for cost effective manufacture of new generations of complex micro products. It is also a critical technology for retaining mdustrial capabilities in high labour cost areas such as Europe since up to 80% of the production cost in some industries is attributed directly to assembly processes. With the continuous trend for product miniaturisation, the scientific and technologi- cal developments in micro-assembly are expected to have a significant long-term economic, demographic and social impact. A distinctive feature of the process is that surface...

Customers increasingly expect products that are smaller, have improved functionality and reliability and cost less. Miniaturisation and integration of mechanical, sensing and control functions within confined spaces is becoming an important trend in designing new products in industries such as automotive, biomedical, pharmaceutical and telecommunications. In micromanufacture often manual assembly becomes unfeasible due to the small size of the products. As a result microassembly is becoming a sector of strategic importance in high labour cost areas due to the specific needs of automated...

Micro-assembly is a key enabling technology for cost effective manufacture of new generations of complex micro products. It is also a critical technology for retaining mdustrial capabilities in high labour cost areas such as Europe since up to 80% of the production cost in some industries is attributed directly to assembly processes. With the continuous trend for product miniaturisation, the scientific and technologi- cal developments in micro-assembly are expected to have a significant long-term economic, demographic and social impact. A distinctive feature of the process is that surface...

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 6th IFIP WG 5.5 International Precision Assembly Seminar, IPAS 2012, held in Chamonix, France, in February 2012. The 15 revised full papers were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. The papers are organized into the following topical sections: micro processes and systems; handling and manipulation in assembly; tolerance management and error compensation methods; metrology and quality control; intelligent control of assembly systems; and process selection and modelling techniques.

This book constitutes the refereed post-proceedings of the 7th IFIP WG 5.5 International Precision Assembly Seminar, IPAS 2014, held in Chamonix, France, in February 2014. The 20 revised full papers were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. The papers cover the following topics: micro-assembly processes and systems ranging from desktop factory automation and packaging of MEMS to self-assembly processes and platforms; handling and manipulation, including flexible gripper systems, fixturing and high precision actuators; tolerance management and error-compensation...

This book constitutes the refereed post-proceedings of the 7th IFIP WG 5.5 International Precision Assembly Seminar, IPAS 2014, held in Chamonix, France, in February 2014.