Coating a working wire for a continuous biological sensor

Inventors

Boock, Robert James • Zhang, Huashi • Gu, Wei

Assignees

Allez Health Inc

Abstract

Methods for coating a working wire for a continuous biological sensor include providing a plurality of wires in a fixture and dipping the plurality of wires into a coating solution according to parameters for a dipping process. A plurality of diameters is measured along a length of at least two coated wires of the plurality of wires in the fixture, using an automated measurement system, as in an in-line process. A controller that is in communication with the automated measurement system determines a thickness difference, the thickness difference being a difference between a thickness setpoint and an aggregate criteria for the plurality of diameters. The controller calculates adjusted parameters for the dipping process based on the thickness difference.

Core Innovation

The invention provides a method for coating a working wire for a continuous biological sensor. A plurality of wires are provided in a fixture, and the wires are dipped into a coating solution according to parameters for a dipping process, supporting coating more than one wire during manufacturing by performing the coating using a dipping process applied to the plurality of wires in the fixture.

During the dipping process, an automated measurement system performs in-line measuring of a plurality of diameters along a length of at least two coated wires in the fixture. A controller determines a thickness difference between a thickness setpoint and an aggregate criteria for the plurality of diameters, and then calculates adjusted parameters for the dipping process based on the thickness difference.

The controller can calculate adjusted parameters that include changes to dipping parameters based on the measured thickness difference. The method refines the determining and calculating by using aggregate criteria such as variance, including variance determined across wires in the fixture. The method can also incorporate viscosity of the coating solution by determining the viscosity and choosing a correlation from a set of correlations based on the viscosity, and can incorporate environmental factors such as airflow and relative humidity of the airflow.

Claims Coverage

The independent claim covers a closed-loop, inline measurement and control approach for coating a plurality of wires by dipping, where diameter measurements along multiple coated wires are used to compute a thickness difference versus a thickness setpoint and then adjust dipping process parameters. Dependent claims further narrow the aggregate criteria used for the thickness difference, including variance forms, and specify example adjusted-parameter changes and factor selections, including withdrawal speed and viscosity-based correlation selection.

Overall, claim coverage centers on using inline diameter measurements across multiple coated wires to compute a thickness difference relative to a thickness setpoint using aggregate criteria, and then calculating adjusted dipping process parameters based on that difference. The dependent refinements specify variance-based thickness-difference calculations, example cross-fixture variance definitions, example adjustment via withdrawal speed under a target window objective, and further refinements incorporating environmental factors and viscosity-based correlation selection.

Stated Advantages

Documented Applications