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September 2014 • The PCB Magazine 37 plastics units at SABIC and Mitsubishi Engineer- ing Plastics (MEP) have both recently presented LDS materials which can be adapted to nearly all pigments that customers demand. Design Rules A complex procedure such as laser direct structuring of three-dimensional bodies re- quires some design guidelines for trouble-free and safe production. Here is an excerpt: • The design should involve as few clamp- ing and positioning steps as possible (short cy- cle times) • Sharp-edged transitions should be avoided in the area of the structures to be metallized • The recommended edge radius is 150 µm (100 µm is possible) • Circuit paths must not be directly adjacent to walls. The steeper the wall, the greater the distance from the track should be. At a wall in- clination of 45° a distance of 150 µm has been tried and tested, as has a wall inclination of 70° and distance of 250 µm To facilitate the work of developers, LPKF provides a direct LDS interface in the MID mod- ule of NEXTRA. With this, 3D injection mold- 3D LDS COMPONENTS continues figure 8: Colorful world of lds using xantar lds from mitsubishi engineering plastics (source: meppr008, mep).