EtchMet™ TM20 (C17200) Strip – High-Strength Spring Material for Mobile Cameras

EtchMet alloy is a material that is tailor made for the springs in voice coil motors and optical image stabilization systems common in smart phone cameras. These devices have a relatively large mass (lense) suspended by extremely small, thin springs. The small size of the springs requires very high strength material to withstand shock loads when the phone is dropped or deliberately tapped against an NFC reader. Therefore, the springs must be made from a very robust material. Furthermore, the lack of a damping mechanism makes high spring stiffness important to combat vibration. EtchMet alloy provides a number of advantages that make it the ideal material for this application:

It has a uniform elastic modulus across all thicknesses/diameters and from product form to product form. This provides consistent stiffness and damping behavior which makes spring calculations easy.

It has a very high resilience allowing it to withstand impact loads without fracturing or permanently deforming.

It has high fatigue strength to withstand many drops and actuation cycles.

It has a uniform, primarily single-phase microstructure, which photochemically machines easily and cleanly for uniform edges free of stress risers.

It is supplied fully precipitation hardened so no further heat treatment is required.

It solders and welds readily.

EtchMet strip is inherently flat with minimal coil set, which helps with alignment during photochemical machining.

Properties

General

Property	Temperature	Value
Density	23.0 °C	8.36 g/cm³

Dimension

Property	Value
Thickness	0.03 - 0.05 mm
Width	1.27 - 406.5 mm

Mechanical

Property	Temperature	Value	Comment
Elastic modulus	23.0 °C	131 GPa
Elongation	23.0 °C	1 %	min.
Hardness, Vickers	23.0 °C	375 [-]	min.
Tensile strength	23.0 °C	1379 MPa	min.
Yield strength Rp0.2	23.0 °C	1344 MPa	min.

Thermal

Property	Temperature	Value
Coefficient of thermal expansion	23.0 °C	1.75E-5 1/K
Thermal conductivity	23.0 °C	105 W/(m·K)

Electrical

Property	Temperature	Value
Electrical resistivity	23.0 °C	6.2E-6 - 1.01E-5 Ω·m
Specific Electrical conductivity		17 - 28 % IACS

Magnetic

Property	Temperature	Value	Comment
Relative magnetic permeability	23.0 °C	1 [-]	max.

Technological properties

Property
Application areas	EtchMet alloy is a material that is tailor made for the springs in voice coil motors and optical image stabilization systems common in smart phone cameras.

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