Thermal ink jet printhead

A thermal ink jet printhead for ejecting and propelling ink droplets on demand therefrom along a flight path from orifices in the printhead toward a recording medium spaced therefrom by momentarily heating ink located in straight capillary channels within the printhead that interconnect respective ones of the orifices with an ink supplying reservoir also within the printhead, the channels and orifices having substantially equal cross-sectional areas, thus forming a straight ink flow path therebetween to produce temporary vapor bubbles in the channels, the heating of the ink being in response to electrical input signals representing digitized signals selectively applied to individual heating elements located one each in the channels adjacent the orifices, the printhead comprising:

• an upper substrate having first and second parallel surfaces and two opposing, parallel edge faces that are perpendicular to the substrate surfaces, the first surface containing a depression and a plurality of parallel straight grooves, one end of the grooves perpendicularly penetrating one upper substrate face and the other ends of the grooves opening into the depression;
• a lower substrate having first and second parallel surfaces and an edge face perpendicular to the lower substrate surfaces, a plurality of heating elements having surfaces with predetermined areas and being formed in a row on the lower substrate first surface parallel with and a predetermined distance from the lower substrate face, together with respective electrodes for selectively addressing the heating elements with said electrical input signals, the addressing electrodes having terminal ends at the edges of the lower substrate first surface other than the one adjacent its edge face;
• a passivation layer covering the lower substrate first surface, including said addressing electrodes, but excluding the heating element surfaces and the terminal ends of the addressing electrodes, these having been cleared of the passivation layer;
• a thick film insulative layer having a predetermined thickness overlaying only the passivation layer, so that the thickness of the thick film layer provides substantially perpendicular walls that individually surround each of the heating elements, thus placing each heating element surface at the bottom of a recess produced by said thick film walls;
• said upper and lower substrate being aligned and bonded together to form the printhead with their respective first surfaces being confrontingly joined and with the upper substrate face having the groove penetrations being coplanar with the lower substrate face, so that the upper substrate depression and grooves respectively become the ink reservoir and the ink channels, the groove penetrations in the upper substrate face become the orifices, the alignment of the upper and lower substrates places one recessed heating element in each channel a predetermined distance from an associated orifice, so that the thick film walls inhibit the growth of the vapor bubbles in a direction parallel with the ink flow path in said channels while promoting bubble growth in a direction normal to the heating elements, whereby the heating element recess in said thick film layer enables closer placement of the heating elements to the orifices and the consequent ejection of higher velocity droplet and yet prevents vaporized ink blowout during said droplet ejecting bubble generation;
• means for connecting the printhead reservoir to a source of ink under a predetermined pressure external to the printhead;
• and
• means for addressing the electrode terminal ends with said input signals.