US 6,547,375 B2Granted

Ink-jet head and manufacturing method thereof

AssigneeSharp Kabushiki Kaisha

InventorsHitoshi Isono, Yoshinori Nakajima

Life of this patent

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Abstract

An ink-jet head includes an electrode formed to continue from an inner surface in an ink chamber to a back end surface of a diaphragm through an inclined surface of the diaphragm. The inclined surface forms an angle greater than 90° with the inner surface in the ink chamber and forms an angle greater than 90° with the back end surface of the diaphragm. The electrode thus has a sufficient thickness on the corner portion formed by the inner surface in the ink chamber and the back end surface of the diaphragm. Accordingly, even if any component touches or hits the corner portion formed by the inner surface and the back end surface, in an assembly process of the ink-jet head, the electrode is prevented from being cut off and thus from being broken. In this way, the electrode can surely be connected electrically to a driving circuit.

Claims2

Dependent claims

An ink-jet head comprising a substrate of piezoelectric material and a plurality of groove-shaped ink chambers each having respective ends in the longitudinal direction that open respectively at front and back end surfaces of said substrate, said ink chambers being partitioned by diaphragms respectively and formed on an upper surface of said substrate, and said ink-jet head further comprising an actuator portion having an electrode formed on an inner surface of each of paired diaphragms facing each other in each ink chamber, said electrode continuing to the back end surface of said substrate,

each diaphragm having a surface which forms an obtuse angle with the inner surface of the diaphragm in the ink chamber and forms an obtuse angle with a back end surface of the diaphragm, and said surface of the diaphragm being formed, in the direction of depth of said ink chamber, in a range including at least a region where said electrode is formed.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Facts

Application: 10/055,288Filed 23 Jan 2002
Priority: JP 2001-01469923 Jan 2001
Published: US 2002/0097304 A125 Jul 2002
Granted: 15 Apr 2003
Term ends: Not estimatedThe source records don’t support an estimate.

Classification6 codes

B41J 2/1609
Production of print heads with piezoelectric elements: of finger type, chamber walls consisting integrally of piezoelectric material
B41J 2/1623
Manufacturing processes: bonding and adhesion
B41J 2/1631
Manufacturing processes: photolithography
B41J 2/1632
Manufacturing processes: machining