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APQ PL185CQ-E6 Highly Expandable Fanless Industrial Panel PC for Optical Coating Equipment

APQ PL185CQ-E6 Highly Expandable Fanless Industrial Panel PC for Optical Coating Equipment

APQ PL185CQ-E6 Highly Expandable Fanless Industrial Panel PC for Optical Coating Equipment

Optical coating is a critical process in high-end manufacturing sectors such as precision optics, semiconductors, consumer electronics, and photovoltaics. By depositing nanoscale thin films on the surfaces of optical components, it enables functions such as anti-reflection, reflection enhancement, optical filtering, and electrical conductivity. Optical coating equipment integrates multiple complex subsystems, including vacuum systems, electron-beam evaporation systems, ion-beam systems, and workpiece carrier systems. The entire process involves multilayer composite coating under high-vacuum conditions, imposing extremely demanding requirements on automation control accuracy, system stability, and the HMI experience.

After multiple rounds of product evaluation and rigorous on-site testing, the customer selected the APQ PL185CQ-E6 Highly Expandable Fanless Industrial Panel PC as the core control and interaction terminal for its next-generation fully automatic precision optical coating equipment.

Customer Challenge

  • Demanding Cleanroom Environment: Optical coating requires an extremely high level of cleanliness. The equipment operates in cleanrooms where vaporized coating materials, chemically active process atmospheres, and frequent cleaning procedures are present. The HMI terminal must therefore provide a high level of protection against dust and water ingress.
  • High-Reliability Fanless Design: Dust and chemically active atmospheres in coating workshops create significant challenges for thermal management. Moving components such as fans can draw in contaminants and cause failures, making fanless passive cooling essential for reducing failure rates.
  • Flexible Modular Expansion: The coating equipment control system must handle multiple tasks, including multi-channel sensor signal acquisition, motion control, and process parameter management. The industrial terminal therefore requires flexible expansion capability to support different display sizes and performance requirements.
  • Full-Screen Capacitive Touch Interaction: Operators frequently set process parameters, switch recipes, and enter production data. The touchscreen must provide fast response and smooth operation, while also supporting operation with gloves.
  • Adaptation to Limited Installation Space: Space inside the coating equipment control cabinet is limited. The panel PC must therefore maintain high performance in a slim, lightweight design suitable for embedded installation.
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APQ Solution

光学镀膜PLxxxCQ-E6智慧核心英文
  • Full-Screen Capacitive Touch + IP65 Front Panel:The PL185CQ-E6 features a full-screen capacitive touch design with an IP65-rated front panel for dust and water protection, resisting oil contamination, dust, and liquid splashes. In coating workshops that require frequent cleaning and contain chemically active atmospheres, the IP65 protection helps prevent corrosion of internal electronic components. The projected capacitive multi-touchscreen supports finger input and capacitive stylus operation, while remaining reliable when operators wear gloves, ensuring that process parameter adjustments can be entered promptly. Its one-piece all-aluminum enclosure provides high structural strength for demanding industrial environments.
  • Fanless Design Reduces Potential Failure Points:The PL185CQ-E6 is powered by Intel 11th Gen Core i3/i5/i7 mobile processors and provides two DDR4-3200 MHz SO-DIMM memory slots. The system uses a fanless architecture with a detachable heat sink. The absence of moving parts not only reduces failure rates but also prevents cooling degradation caused by dust ingestion. In coating workshops containing dust and chemically active atmospheres, the fanless design eliminates the risk of shutdowns caused by fan failure and significantly improves long-term operating reliability.
  • Modular Design for Different Size and Performance Requirements:The PL185CQ-E6 adopts a modular architecture that combines an L-Series industrial display with an E-Series embedded industrial PC in a backpack-style configuration. The display and industrial PC can be selected and upgraded independently: an unsuitable screen size can be addressed by replacing only the display, while insufficient computing performance can be resolved by upgrading only the industrial PC. The product is available in 11 display sizes from 10.1 to 27 inches, including both standard-aspect and widescreen formats. Because different optical coating systems have different display-size and computing-performance requirements, this modular design enables application-specific configuration, flexible adaptation, and fast delivery.
  • Rich I/O and aDoor Expansion for Multi-Device Connectivity:The PL185CQ-E6 provides dual Intel Gigabit Ethernet ports for network communication and data upload. Four USB Type-A ports allow convenient connection of peripherals such as keyboards, mice, USB flash drives, and industrial cameras. HDMI and DisplayPort outputs support high-resolution displays, while two standard RS-232/485 serial ports provide stable connectivity to PLCs, sensors, barcode scanners, and other field devices. The system also supports APQ's proprietary aDoor expansion modules for adding wireless functions such as Wi-Fi and 4G, meeting application-specific requirements across different industries. An integrated M.2 Key-M slot supports NVMe SSDs for high-speed data read/write performance.
  • Wide-Temperature and Vibration-Resistant for Industrial Environments:The PL185CQ-E6 supports a 12-28 VDC wide-range power input, an operating temperature range of -20°C to 60°C, and a storage temperature range of -20°C to 70°C. It has also passed vibration and shock testing, enabling long-term stable operation in harsh industrial environments. Both embedded mounting and VESA mounting are supported for flexible integration into different coating equipment control cabinets.

Value Achievements:

  • Stable Operation in Harsh Environments: The IP65-rated front panel effectively protects against dust, chemically active atmospheres, and frequent cleaning in coating workshops. The fanless design eliminates failure risks associated with moving parts, significantly reducing equipment failure rates and supporting long-term stable operation of the coating production line.
  • Significantly Improved Interaction Efficiency: The responsive full-screen capacitive touchscreen enables operators to quickly set process parameters, switch recipes, and enter data. Reliable touch operation while wearing gloves helps shorten coating process adjustment time.
  • Modular Configuration Reduces Selection Costs: The independent selection and upgrade of the display and industrial PC allow customers to configure the system according to the size and computing requirements of different coating machines. This eliminates the need to develop a separate control system for each machine model, greatly reducing product-line management complexity and inventory costs.
  • Reduced System Integration Complexity: Dual Gigabit Ethernet ports, four USB ports, two RS-232/485 serial ports, and aDoor wireless expansion enable single-system connectivity and control for multiple coating equipment subsystems, including the vacuum system, heating system, ion source, and coating thickness monitoring system. The complete system can be deployed without additional expansion hardware.
  • Long-Term Reliability: Wide-temperature operation from -20°C to 60°C, vibration and shock resistance, and fanless passive cooling ensure long-term stable operation under high-temperature and vibration conditions in coating workshops, significantly reducing maintenance frequency.
光学镀膜PLxxxCQ-E6结构图英文
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