July 20th, 2015

Aculon, Inc., a proven nanocoating supplier to the electronics industry, announces the launch of their NanoProof Series of PCB water & oil protection products.

Aculon’s proprietary surface modification technology treats a PCB to be repellent to water and/or oil while maintaining its full operating functionality.
Until now water-resistance product offerings generally fall into two categories: conformal solution based hydro/oleophobic coatings that repel fluids but require some level of masking or “keep-out” areas, and vacuum-deposited coatings (which is a batch process and also require masking) such as parylene-based treatments. Aculon® NanoProof™ surface treatments create a third category - no mask solution based hydro/oleophobic coatings that are done on an inline basis and deliver the benefits of conformal coatings yet eliminate the need for costly capital investment and avoiding the bottlenecking batch process of vacuum based manufacturing or masking operations.
Aculon’s NanoProof™ Series offer customers a range of PCB waterproofing solutions from protecting against accidental water damage (NanoProof 1.0) to IPX7, immersion in water at one meter depth for 30 minutes (NanoProof™ 3.0,3.5,4.0), to greater barrier properties that can withstand 100 hours immersion in sweat solutions and some of the most stringent test methods developed for non-hermetic components (NanoProof™ 5.0) .
The benefits of using Aculon NanoProof include improved device reliability, reduced returns from device failures, and lower system wide costs particularly when compared to the cost of a vacuum deposition processes. In addition the electrical connections are not impacted and the integrity of the signal strength, antenna and acoustic performance remain in tact.

Aculon NanoProof™ Series uses a mix of Aculon’s Proprietary Transition Metal Complexate technology (TMC) and fluorinated acrylic polymers to achieve a series of products that are compatible with all of the common material types used in SMT parts. Aculon’s NanoProof™ series are sprayable or dip based coatings that do not require a cure and have no impact on conductivity testing. NanoProof is safe for us in factory environments as it is non toxic. While some of the NanoProof™ series are so thin that they are invisible to naked eye, all of the Nanoproof™ series are available with UV tracer dye added to ensure detection at customer sites.
Aculon’s NanoProof technology has already been adopted by a number of customers as they were able to demonstrate improved product performance while utilizing a flexible application process that can lower the total operating costs when compared to parylene based coatings. This series is designed so that that there is an ideal protection solution for PCB’s in need of water protection!
“For several years Aculon has been a leading supplier of nanocoatings to the electronics industry. We are delighted to extend our product offering to include the NanoProof series of treatments that can protect customer’s PCB from water damage and immersion. In the electronics business we have learned often one product does not fit all, hence we developed a series of product as different customers have different requirements” said Edward Hughes, CEO of Aculon. “We will work with our customers to ensure that they get the right product at the right price to meet their requirements.”