Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

Panasonic Corporation

Osamu Watanabe

Kenji Tomita

Isaku Kanno

Koji Matsuo

Eiji Fujii

Ryoichi Takayama

Hiroyoshi Tanaka

Shigeyuki Takao

Koichi Kotera

Isamu Inoue

Shintarou Hara

Kazumi Sadamatsu

Hidetoshi Tanoue

Satoru Fujii

Hiroyuki Matsuo

Eiichiro Tanaka

Hideaki Horio

Takanori Nakano

Yuuji Toyomura

Kazuo Nishimura

Shintaro Hara

Kazunari Chikanawa

Shogo Matsubara

Yoshiaki Nagashigi

Masaya Tanshin

One objective of the invention is to provide a highly-efficient and reliable piezoelectric thin film device by improving the piezoelectric function of a piezoelectric thin film and obtaining a crystal structure wherein the dependency of a piezoelectric constant, relative to a voltage, is superior, and to also provide a method for manufacturing this piezoelectric thin film device. Another objective of the invention is to provide an inkjet head that satisfactorily exhibits the piezoelectric performance of the piezoelectric thin film device and that has a superior withstand voltage function and driving reliability, and to provide a high quality inkjet recording apparatus on which this inkjet head can be mounted. A piezoelectric thin film device includes: crystal grains that form piezoelectric thin film and grain boundaries that encircle the crystal grains, wherein the same crystal orientation is established for the grain boundaries and the crystal grains.

Piezoelectric thin film device and piezoelectric thin film device manufacturing method, and inkjet head and inkjet recording apparatus

A piezoelectric element includes a pressure chamber member that has an opening communicating with a nozzle, a vibrating plate that is disposed on the pressure chamber member so as to cover the opening, a lower electrode that is disposed on the vibrating plate, a piezoelectric body that is disposed on the lower electrode, an upper electrode that is disposed on the piezoelectric body and in a region opposed to the opening, and a lead electrode that is disposed on the piezoelectric body, that extends from the upper electrode, and that has a width smaller than that of the upper electrode. The piezoelectric body includes a groove portion that is disposed in a predetermined region along an edge portion of the opening and an inactive region (piezoelectric inactive region) that is a region other than the groove portion, that is disposed along the edge portion of the opening, and that does not substantially serve as a piezoelectric element. The lead electrode is disposed in the piezoelectric inactive region.

Piezoelectric element, ink jet head, and ink jet recording device

A ferroelectric element is described which has a structure including a common electrodea ferroelectric filmformed on the common electrodean individual electrodeformed on the ferroelectric filma lead wirefor feeding electric power to the individual electrodewhich is formed on the same plane as of the individual electrodeand a protection filmentirely covering the exposed parts of the ferroelectric filmand the individual electrodeand covering the lead wireThe protection filmis preferably made of a material whose Young's modulus is smaller than that of the ferroelectric filmexactly 1/20 or smaller of the Young's modulus of the ferroelectric filmFurther, the ferroelectric film is formed with the insulation reinforcing film containing at least one of the elements constituting the ferroelectric film.

Ferroelectric element and actuator using the same, and ink jet head and ink jet recording device

A piezoelectric thin film element D, in which a piezoelectric thin film with first and second electrode films and respectively formed on its opposite surfaces in the thickness direction is held by a hold film , is fabricated by forming each film , and on a film formation substrate 11 and removing the film formation substrate by etching. Even when the hold film is made of material such as resin and therefore exhibits relatively poor adhesion with respect to the other films, the piezoelectric thin film is protected from damage by etchant because the first electrode film which comes into contact with the film formation substrate is formed such that the overall circumference of a peripheral edge portion of the first electrode film laterally extends beyond the lateral surface of the piezoelectric thin film and closely adheres to the hold film

Piezoelectric thin film element, ink jet recording head using such a piezoelectric thin film element, and their manufacture methods

There is provided a plastic base material having a reformed layer formed on a plastic substrate by reforming the surface layer thereof into a component containing fluorine at the ratio of the number of fluorine atoms to the number of carbon atoms, F/C, of 0.85 or more and 1.30 or less, and having highly durable water repellency and ink repellency. The method of manufacturing such a plastic base material comprises a step of reforming the surface of the plastic substrate into a fluorine-containing carbon layer by imparting a specific energy to fluorine-containing plasma by applying an RF bias voltage to the plastic substrate to form a surface having highly durable water repellency and ink repellency. A highly durable ink-jet printer that enables high-quality printing can be provided by the use of a head for an ink-jet printer fabricated by using this plastic base material.

Plastic base material and method for the manufacture thereof; and head for ink-jet printer and method for the manufacture thereof

In order to provide a miniaturized ink jet head having a piezoelectric actuator by which ink in a pressure chamber is emitted and to improve its productivity and reliability, a vibration plate is made up of two layers having different Young's moduli, i.e., a layer having a smaller Young's modulus and a layer having a greater Young's modulus. Further, the Young's modulus of each of the layers and is set at values ranging from 50 GPa to 350 GPa and the total thickness of the vibration plate is set at values ranging from 1 &mgr;m to 7 &mgr;m.

Ink jet head and method for the manufacture thereof

Formed on a surface of an oscillation plate on the side of a head main body portion is an intermediate layer having a window portion through which a displacement portion of the oscillation plate is exposed to a pressure chamber. The intermediate layer and a compartmenting wall of the main body portion are adhered together by an adhesive of electro-deposition resin. The intermediate layer is formed of copper, having a thickness of 5 &mgr;m, so that, when a part of the adhesive is forced out, such a forced-out adhesive portion will not adhere to the displacement portion of the oscillation plate.

An ink jet head H is downsized by making piezoelectric elements top electrodes provided on surfaces of the piezoelectric elements that are opposite to pressure rooms and bottom electrode provided on other surfaces of the piezoelectric elements that are on the pressure rooms into thin films in piezoelectric actuators a crack covering layer made from an electric insulating material is arranged on the surfaces of the piezoelectric elements that are on the bottom electrode so that the electric insulating material is filled into the cracks in the piezoelectric elements in order to prevent the piezoelectric actuators from malfunctioning due to the cracks occurring during the film formation of the bottom electrode and piezoelectric elements

Ink-jet head, method for fabricating same, and ink-jet recording device

The method of manufacturing an ink-jet head of this invention includes the steps of forming plural individual electrodes and plural piezoelectric devices stacked in this order on a supporting substrate; flattening a top surface of the supporting substrate including the individual electrodes and the piezoelectric devices by filling a filler in a portion on the supporting substrate where the individual electrodes and the piezoelectric devices are not formed up to substantially the same level as a level of upper surfaces of the piezoelectric devices; forming a common electrode on the entire flattened top surface of the supporting substrate; fixing a pressure chamber part for forming pressure chambers on the common electrode; and removing the supporting substrate after fixing the pressure chamber part on the common electrode. Thus, the entire plane on which the common electrode is to be formed is flattened before forming the common electrode.

Ink-jet head and method of manufacturing the same

An ink jet including a head body including plural pressure chamber concaves each having a supply port for supplying ink and a discharge port for discharging ink, and a piezoelectric actuator including mutually electrically connected vibration plates that cover the concaves of the head body in order to form pressure chambers together with the concaves and are separately provided correspondingly to one or plural pressure chambers, piezoelectric device respectively provided on surfaces of the vibration plates opposite to the pressure chambers correspondingly to the pressure chambers and individual electrodes respectively provided on surfaces of said piezoelectric devices opposite to said vibration plates for applying a voltage to said piezoelectric devices together with said vibration plates. The vibration plates are deformed in a manner that volumes of the pressure chambers are decreased by applying a voltage to the piezoelectric devices through the vibration plates and the individual electrodes, whereby ink contained in the pressure chambers is discharged through the discharge ports. Additionally, a portion of each of the vibration plates corresponding to each of the pressure chambers is bent into a convex projecting toward an opposite direction to the corresponding pressure chamber due to a compressive internal stress action of each of the piezoelectric devices.

Ink-jet head with piezoelectric actuator

There is provided a plastic base material having a reformed layer,formed on a plastic substrate,by reforming the surface layer thereof into a component containing fluorine at the ratio of the number of fluorine atoms to the number of carbon atoms, F/C, of 0.85 or more and 1.30 or less, and having highly durable water repellency and ink repellency. The method of manufacturing such a plastic base material comprises a step of reforming the surface of the plastic substrate,into a fluorine-containing carbon layer by imparting a specific energy to fluorine-containing plasma by applying an RF bias voltage to the plastic substrate,to form a surface having highly durable water repellency and ink repellency. A highly durable ink-jet printer that enables high-quality printing can be provided by the use of a head for an ink-jet printer fabricated by using this plastic base material.

Plastic substrate and method of manufacturing the same, and ink jet printer head and method of manufacturing the same

A plurality of rolls are supported and freely shiftable on a rotating supporting shaft. The rolls have a V-groove with a circular arc at the bottom of the groove. The plurality of rolls are arranged on a swivel table so that the rotating supporting shaft corresponds to the radial direction of the swivel table. A component of force acting on the roll in the direction of the supporting shaft is alleviated by a shift of each roll in the direction of the supporting shaft. This is accomplished by rotating the swivel table with the bottom of a metal sheet tapered cylinder pushed down against the V-groove. Thus, curling on the lower end of the cylinder is accomplished without generating a bulge in the neighborhood of the lower end of the cylinder and without preforming.

Growing community of inventors

Kumamoto, Japan

Osamu Watanabe