Flexible Tiled Display With Compressive Conductive Connectors
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional large tiled LED displays are cumbersome due to bulky support structures, complex cabling, and challenges in maintaining uniformity and reliability, especially in large displays where thermal expansion and visual artefacts become significant issues.
Innovation Solution
A tiled display system utilizing flexible display tiles with a judiciously designed connection mechanism, including compressible conductive materials and modular substrates with separate power, data, and control tracks that extend from one edge to the other, allowing for easy assembly and maintenance, and minimizing ad-hoc cabling while ensuring reliable electrical contact.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Area of stationary object
If conventional LED display screens are used to create large tiled displays, then the display size can be increased, but the structure becomes large, thick and heavy requiring bulky support structures
Solution Approach 1:
The display is divided into multiple flexible tiles that can be independently manufactured and assembled. Each tile contains its own LED modules mounted on flexible substrates, allowing the large display to be constructed from lightweight modular units rather than a single heavy structure
Solution Approach 2:
Flexible substrates and thin-film technologies are used to replace conventional rigid display panels. The flexible nature of these substrates enables thinner, lighter construction while maintaining display functionality, eliminating the need for bulky support structures
2Ease of manufacture
If flexible LED screens are used with integrated circuits situated in openings of a fixation layer, then assembly is simplified, but the number of power and signal conducting cables and connectors increases rapidly making the structure cumbersome
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple functions are combined into the flexible substrate itself. The substrate serves as both the mechanical support for LED modules and the pathway for power and signal conductors. Integrated circuits are mounted directly on the flexible substrate, eliminating the need for separate fixation layers and reducing cable requirements
Solution Approach 2:
The flexible substrate performs multiple roles simultaneously: structural support, electrical connection pathway, and mechanical flexibility carrier. This multi-functionality reduces the number of separate components needed, particularly reducing the number of cables and connectors required
3Reliability
If cables are routed between tiles to power and control flexible LED screens, then electrical connections are established, but the cable dimensions impose a minimum pixel pitch and resolution causing visual artefacts
Solution Approach 1:
The flexible substrate acts as an intermediary that carries both power/signal conductors and LED modules in an integrated manner. This eliminates the need for separate external cables between tiles, as the substrate itself provides the electrical connection pathway with dimensions that do not constrain pixel pitch
4Area of stationary object
If discrete luminous sources are distributed over adjacent flexible display tiles, then display area can be expanded, but maintaining uniform color and brightness becomes more difficult due to visible seams and thermal expansion
Solution Approach 1:
The flexible substrates allow tiles to be mounted with minimal gaps between them, reducing visible seams. The flexibility enables precise alignment during assembly, ensuring uniform spacing and reducing variations in pixel pitch that would cause visual artifacts
Solution Approach 2:
The flexible nature of the substrates allows for adjustments in mounting parameters such as spacing and tension, which can be optimized to minimize visible seams and maintain uniform thermal expansion characteristics across the tiled display
5Stability of the object's composition
If conventional support structures are used to maintain alignment of display tiles, then tile alignment is achieved, but the support structure becomes cumbersome and difficult to assemble and disassemble
Solution Approach 1:
The flexible substrates themselves provide the alignment and stability functions previously requiring separate support structures. The substrates can be mounted directly to surfaces or to each other with minimal additional hardware, enabling easy assembly and disassembly while maintaining precise tile alignment
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution reduces the need for extensive support infrastructure, minimizes visual discontinuities, enhances reliability by allowing graceful degradation of performance, and maintains uniform pixel pitch across the display, addressing the challenges of assembly, maintenance, and visual uniformity in large tiled displays.
Implementation Method 1
The connecting element comprises a mechanism applying a force on a part of the connecting element and keeping said part pressed and in contact with a surface of the second conductor
Data Source
Figure 1a
Figure 1b
Figure 2a
AI summary
The invention pertains to a tiled display comprising discrete luminous sources distributed over at least two adjacent flexible display tiles, each of said flexible display tiles being configured to drive the discrete luminous sources on it when connected to a power supply and when receiving data and control signals; wherein the power, data and control signals are provided to the tiles through conducting tracks formed on a carrier substrate, wherein an electrical connection between a first conductor on the carrier substrate and a second conductor on a tile is established by means of a connecting element comprising a resilient means keeping it pressed and in contact with a surface of the first conductor or second conductor. The invention also pertains to a carrier substrate and to a flexible display tile for use in such tiled displays.