Fibercuit: Prototyping High-Resolution Flexible and Kirigami Circuits with a Fiber Laser Engraver

TL;DR

Fibercuit introduces rapid, on-demand fabrication techniques for high-resolution, flexible, and kirigami circuits using a fiber laser engraver, enabling customizable 3D circuit prototypes without outsourcing.

Contribution

It presents novel laser-based methods and a software pipeline for fabricating complex flexible and kirigami circuits, reducing reliance on traditional PCB manufacturing.

Findings

Enables laser cutting of copper composites for fine traces

Allows laser folding of copper substrates into kirigami structures

Facilitates laser soldering of surface-mount components

Abstract

Prototyping compact devices with unique form factors often requires the PCB manufacturing process to be outsourced, which can be expensive and time-consuming. In this paper, we present Fibercuit, a set of rapid prototyping techniques to fabricate high-resolution, flexible circuits on-demand using a fiber laser engraver. We showcase techniques that can laser cut copper-based composites to form fine-pitch conductive traces, laser fold copper substrates that can form kirigami structures, and laser solder surface-mount electrical components using off-the-shelf soldering pastes. Combined with our software pipeline, an end user can design and fabricate flexible circuits which are dual-layer and three-dimensional, thereby exhibiting a wide range of form factors. We demonstrate Fibercuit by showcasing a set of examples, including a custom dice, flex cables, custom end-stop switches, electromagnetic coils, LED earrings and a circuit in the form of kirigami crane.