Micromanufacturing: A review—part II

Abstract

This article discusses an overview of microforming, microcasting and microwelding processes. In the case of microforming, the processes reviewed are micro deep drawing, microforging, microextrusion, microrolling, microstamping, microhydroforming and incremental microforming. This section also throws some light on how the lasers have been used for microbending and micropunching purposes. The work done in the area of physics of microforming processes has also been discussed briefly. This article also deals with different types of microcasting processes particularly permanent mold and investment microcasting processes. The applications of these microcasting processes have been specified in different fields of engineering, biomedical and so on. Some areas in which further research work is needed have been identified. It includes both theoretical and experimental works which need attention. The last part of this article deals with microjoining in general and laser microjoining in particular. This section discusses the types of the lasers that are being used for microjoining purposes. The process parameters (laser, optics, system and material) have been explained, and some work done on the parametric analysis has been reported briefly. Various applications of laser microjoining have been elaborated before the last section on concluding remarks. This last section presents, in very brief, the areas in which further work is required in microjoining processes.