Characteristics of screen-printed polymer thick films

The physical, electrical, and temperature dependent properties of thick film polymeric materials are presented. It has been shown that the sensitivity of the planar polymer piezoresistive gauges is comparable to that of the metal-foil gauges. Whereas the sandwich (MRM-metal resistor metal) configurations exhibit similar characteristics to those of cermet thick film MRM gauges, The electrical tests were carried out on films in the MRM configuration and have shown the existence of electroforming at voltages exceeding the forming voltage. Further increasing the applied voltage is shown to produce both s-type and N-type negative resistance within the films, depending on the region of operation within the V- I characteristic.