Uniform and simultaneous fabrication of high-precision and high-density orifice, channel, and reservoirs for ink-jet printheads

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Abstract
We have fabricated a unified Orifice Plate Assembly (OPA) for high-resolution inkjet printheads, which has orifices, ink flow channels, and reservoirs three-dimensionally in a single body, using single-step 3D photolithography followed by single-step electroplating. These three components are the core in inkjet printheads because they determine almost all of ink fluidics, especially the size and trajectory of an ink drop. Therefore, for high-resolution beyond 600 dpi, a unified and high-precision orifice plate assembly is strongly needed. By newly devised 3D patterning technique, namely Multi- Exposure and Single Development (MESD), we form the 3D photoresist mold for the unified OPA. Once the 3D unified OPA mold is fabricated, nickel electroplating is performed on it until the roof of the channel molds is fully covered by the overplated Ni, and until all the plating fronts around orifices in the entire wafer converge to their salient orifice molds. This converging margin in the electroplating step, which is originated from the salient orifice mold, excellently enhanced the wafer-level uniformity of the orifice size and shape. We neatly demonstrated both the unified OPA of various orifice size and shape, and one corresponding to a 2400 dpi- inkjet printhead, using MESD method with a single-coated 41 micrometer-thick photoresist of Hoechst AZ9262.© (1998) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

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