This work describes the design and development of a general microassembly system that is used to construct 3D microstructures or 3D micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) from a set of micro-components. The term ‘general’ is used to indicate that this system is not application specific, but rather, can accommodate a range of applications. M icroassembly is a process of manipulating micro-components used to build a micro-system, from their original location of fabrication, to the final location of the assembly. Due to the design complexity of many next generation MEMS applications, microassembly will certainly play an important role in future MEMS development. In order to design the microassembly system, three main areas are investigated in this research, (a) The design, construction and testing of a robotic manipulator that is compatible with the manipulation of MEMS micro-components, (b) The design, construction and testing of a suitable end-effector system used to grasp/interface onto micro-components, (c) The design, fabrication and testing of a micro-joining system used to create secure joints between micro-components.

These three areas of research have all been successfully accomplished. A robotic manipulator referred to as the MJMP has been designed, constructed and used in the manipulation of micro-components and the assembly of 3D microstructures. An end-effector system consisting of a micro-scaled microgripper that is solder bonded to a macro-scaled ‘contact head’ device, has been designed and fabricated. It has been used for grasping various types of micro-components and releasing them after they have been assembled. Finally, three different types of micro-mechanical joint systems have been designed, fabricated and used to join together multiple micro-components into 3D microstructures or sub-assemblies. This work has been successfully used to create a few proof-of-concept devices such as micro-coils and micro-transformers, with properties that were not previously possible to construct. The size of the microgrippers used, the micro-components used, and the 3D microstructures assembled in this work, are considerably smaller than those used by other current microassembly methods. The results of this work have provided a new way to assemble microstructures, and have resulted in a number of contributions to the MEMS field.