ELECTROFLIGHT
THE CHALLENGE Electroflight, a technology and engineering services organisation specialising in bespoke aerospace battery systems, approached the MTC’s Manufacturing Support Services (MSS) team to conduct a project looking into improvements in battery cell cleaning. The business, which operates in the aerospace and defence sectors, had recently conducted a study into wire bond reliability and strength following investment into new wire bonding processes. This research identified battery cell cleanliness as a major factor. Electroflight recognised that its existing manual methods of cleaning battery cells were labour intensive and caused issues with variability and challenges with scalability. The MTC was tasked with identifying new cleaning methods and technologies to improve the cleaning process and subsequently enhance the wire bond weld strength and bonding strength consistency.
MTC’S SOLUTION Laser cleaning was identified as the most suitable cleaning process, and in the first phase of the project, the MTC investigated the feasibility of laser cleaning of the battery cell to remove oxidisation and contamination. A series of experimental trials were conducted and a total of 36 cells were laser programmed, cleaned and characterised, to assess the impact of the cleaning method on bond strength and variability. Phase Two of the project focused on further optimising the cleaning process on both old and new cell batches. The results were compared against Electroflight’s existing manual wet chemistry and mechanical cleaning methods, and optimum laser cleaning parameters were established
The MTC have been excellent to work with. Everyone on the project was engaged from the start and incredibly proactive, and their passion and enthusiasm are reflected in what we’ve been able to achieve in a short space of time. The team also really understood the brief and identified a solution that not only met our technical objectives, but also our commercial and strategic objectives too. Douglas Campbell Technical Director, Electroflight
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