Hot water heater with touch design

PolyIC will be showcasing mass applications for its PolyTC capacitive sensors at this year’s Embedded World from 27 February to 1 March in Nuremberg, and at LOPEC from 14-15 March in Munich. The following series production touch applications for white goods will be exhibited: a front panel of a hot water heater from A. O. Smith with touch control, and a demonstrator for a sensor control panel that has been successfully employed in several washing machine models from BSH. Touch- and gesture-controlled functionality for automotive interior applications will also be demonstrated. Using a variety of door trims as examples, a diverse range of options for day/night designs and touch sensor controllable ambient lighting will be presented. Also, on display will be a trackpad featuring a multi-touch capability with sliders and touch buttons, as well as a backlighting function – all implemented by means of a single sensor.

“Our PolyTC sensors have been trialed in demanding applications and are now produced and employed in high volumes. Besides our current series-production applications, we also have some exciting applications in the design phase, and are receiving new inquiries from a variety of markets on an almost daily basis,” reports Gerhard Scheuing, Product Manager at PolyIC. “The success of our sensor technology can be attributed to its flexibility. Thanks to the high level of functionality, optical quality, and ease of integration of the sensors, they are suitable for a wide range of applications, whether in the automotive sector, for home appliances or consumer electronics,” explains Scheuing.

PolyTC sensors feature metal-grid-based conductor tracks. The so-called metal mesh structures used for PolyTC sensors are silver-based and therefore exhibit outstanding conductivity. At the same time, the sensors offer a high level of transparency because the conductor tracks can be produced with a width of less than ten micrometers. This makes them ideally suited for touch displays. Additionally, being mechanically flexible, even curved components can be equipped with them. Since these elastic sensors consist simply of metal structures on a thin PET substrate, they can be integrated in a space- and weight-saving manner in rapid industrial processes.