JP2009171481A - Method of manufacturing crystal oscillating reed, and crystal oscillator - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To perform bevel or convex processing of a compact AT-cut crystal oscillator or the like by forming a resist film, controlled in thickness change, on a crystal blank according to a simple method. <P>SOLUTION: A mask is matched with a crystal blank 1, and a resist 2 is applied (printed) in a three-dimensional shape (thickness change) by a squeegee 4. Thus, the resist 2 tapered smoothly obliquely from an end to the center can be applied. Tapering from the end to the center of the resist can be changed, in screen printing, by characters such as resist viscosity or thixotropy of a resin or paste that becomes the resist, printing conditions such as printing pressure, printing speed and the like and further, the mask to be used. A bevel or convex shape is applied thereafter by dry etching, wet etching, blast working and the like. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2009,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a method for manufacturing a quartz crystal resonator element, and more particularly to a method for processing a quartz base plate in which a cross section is processed into a bevel or convex shape.

  A crystal resonator is used as a reference oscillation source of an electronic device, a clock source of a microcomputer, and the like. In particular, with the miniaturization of portable communication devices, the crystal resonator is also surface-mounted and miniaturized. As such a crystal resonator, for example, an AT cut crystal resonator has a good temperature characteristic and is widely used as a high-frequency resonator.

  When the crystal resonator element of the AT-cut crystal resonator is a small surface-mount type, it is rectangular as shown in FIG. 8 (a) a plan view, (b) a bevel cross-sectional view, and (c) a convex cross-sectional view. It has a shape. When the frequency is about 30 MHz or less, the quartz crystal resonator element is subjected to R-surface treatment for four corners in order to improve vibration characteristics, and bevel processing or convex processing of the end surface is performed. The AT-cut quartz crystal resonator element has a thickness of about 60 μm at 28 Hz, for example, and is beveled by forming a gentle taper by applying a height of about 30 μm to several tens to several hundreds of μm in bevel processing.

  Such bevel processing or convex processing has been conventionally performed by barrel polishing, but barrel polishing has become difficult as the crystal vibrating piece has been downsized, and studies on dry etching and blast processing are being conducted. . In dry etching and blast processing, it is necessary to make the resist film into a three-dimensional shape that is in the form of a bevel or a convex, and various methods have been devised.

For example, the light intensity is changed by changing the thickness or density of the photomask material in exposure, and the resist thickness is changed by changing the photosensitive thickness of the resist (Patent Document 1). Alternatively, the resist thickness is changed by changing the photosensitive thickness of the resist by changing the light intensity with an optical system during exposure (Patent Document 2 and Patent Document 5). Alternatively, a resin or a low-melting-point substance is melted or viscous, and the shape of the contact angle formed is used (Patent Document 3, Patent Document 4, and Patent Document 5). Alternatively, a cover formed in a predetermined three-dimensional shape in advance is pasted (Patent Document 5). Or a resist is shape | molded with a type | mold (patent document 3).
JP 2003-234632 A JP 2004-120508 A JP 2004-349365 A JP 2005-217370 A Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2005-244677

  Changing the light intensity to be exposed in accordance with the thickness of the resist film required for the photomask and the exposure optical system places a heavy burden on the creation of the photomask and the installation of the exposure optical system. In addition, using a contact angle shape formed by melting a resin or a low-melting-point substance in a molten or viscous state has a great restriction on the control of the obtained bevel or convex shape, and the degree of freedom in shape is small. The method of attaching a cover formed into a predetermined three-dimensional shape or forming it with a mold has a drawback that it is not easy to create the cover or the mold itself. In addition, the use of a resin as a resist has a drawback that it is difficult to apply to blasting and wet etching, and that dry etching cannot achieve a good etching selectivity with quartz.

  Therefore, the present invention provides a simple method of forming a resist film with a controlled three-dimensional shape, that is, a change in thickness, on a quartz base plate to enable beveling and convex processing of a small AT-cut quartz crystal resonator. It is the purpose.

  In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, in the method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to the present invention, a step of applying (printing) a resist film in a three-dimensional shape (change in thickness) to a quartz base plate by screen printing, and processing by etching or blasting And processing the cross section of the quartz base plate into a bevel or convex shape.

  The cross section of the opening of the mask used in the screen printing method has a taper.

  The resist film is applied at least once.

  The resist film is recoated by changing at least one of the opening area of the mask used in the screen printing method or the thickness of the resist film.

  The resist film contains a nonmetallic inorganic substance.

  The etching is dry etching.

  The etching is wet etching.

  In the crystal resonator of the present invention, the resonator element is manufactured by the manufacturing method.

  In the manufacturing method of the quartz crystal resonator element according to the invention of claim 1, the resist end or the end portion of the resist is determined depending on the printing conditions such as the resist resin or paste properties such as the resist viscosity and thixotropy, the printing pressure and the printing speed, and the mask used. The taper shape can be easily changed in various ways.

  According to the second aspect of the present invention, by tapering the cross section of the opening portion of the mask so that the opening of the mask on the substrate side is wider than the opening of the mask on the squeegee moving surface side, the taper of the resist end thickness generated by screen printing is increased. The shape can be smoothly and smoothly changed.

  According to the invention of claim 3, the directionality of resist filling to the wall surface portion of the mask opening portion caused by screen printing can be eliminated, and the difference of the resist end thickness depending on the taper-shaped application (printing) direction can be eliminated. .

  According to the invention of claim 4, the thickness of the resist can be changed in a wider range.

  According to the invention of claim 5, it can be applied to all of dry etching, wet etching, and blasting, and the matching of the etching selectivity between the resist and the crystal becomes good.

  According to the sixth and seventh aspects of the invention, the quartz base plate can be processed by various processing methods, and the optimal processing suitable for the purpose can be selected.

  According to the invention of claim 8, a small and high-performance AT cut crystal resonator can be easily realized.

  The best mode for carrying out the present invention will be described in detail below.

  FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view showing a resist film coating process by a screen printing method for etching or blasting a quartz base plate of the present invention. As shown in the resist application process by screen printing in FIG. 1A, the mask 3 is aligned with the crystal base plate 1, and the resist 2 is applied with the squeegee 4.

  This makes it possible to apply resist 2 having a taper that is gently inclined from the end portion to the center, as shown in FIG. The taper from the edge of the resist to the center changes depending on the printing conditions such as the resist resin or paste properties such as resist viscosity and thixotropy, printing pressure and printing speed, and the mask used in the screen printing method. Can be made.

  Resist materials such as solvent-soluble resins, thermosetting resins, and ultraviolet curable resins can be used as the resist material. These can adjust viscosity, thixotropy, etc., depending on the solvent, degree of polymerization, additives, etc., and thus can control the three-dimensional shape, ie, mainly the inclination from the end to the center.

  However, resin-based resists can be applied to dry etching, but are difficult to apply to blasting or wet etching using an etchant. Also, it is not easy to adapt the etching rate between quartz and resin, which are inorganic substances, even in dry etching. For this reason, a non-metallic inorganic substance is used that has a viscosity, a thixotropy adjusting component, a solvent component, etc., called a vehicle, and a viscous paste in which the printability is adjusted.

  Printing (coating) is performed using this paste, and this is reacted or hardened by heat treatment, or the organic component is removed to form a resist made of a nonmetallic inorganic substance. This paste can be solidified with a low melting point when low melting point glass is used as a main component or low melting point glass is used as a binder.

  Alternatively, hydration hardening of calcium compounds, sol-gel reaction, water glass (alkali silicate), phosphoric acid compounds, and the like can also be used. Also, low melting point sintering of ultrafine particles can be used. In any case, it is necessary to perform the heat treatment at a temperature below the crystal transition temperature.

  By using such a hard and brittle non-metallic inorganic material as a resist, dry etching and blasting can be performed.

  As dry etching, ion etching without reaction can be used in addition to reactive dry etching. The ion etching has an advantage that a wide range of applicable non-metallic inorganic resist materials can be selected. In dry etching, the crystal may be contaminated by the reattachment of scattered substances, so that it is necessary to perform sufficient cleaning by wet etching or the like.

  The resist made of this non-metallic inorganic substance is only a sacrificial layer for adjusting the etching amount of crystal during etching, and is finally removed so that durability like a structural material is not It has the advantage that it can be used even if it is a chemically unstable low-melting glass, a component that does not fully vitrify, or a ceramic that is not sufficiently sintered.

  When SiO2 or silica is used as a main component as a non-metallic inorganic substance component, wet etching is also possible.

  There are two types of masks: a stencil type (opening mask) such as a metal mask and a mesh type in which a photosensitive resin is applied to a mesh.

  FIG. 2 is a sectional view of the opening of the mask of the present invention. A taper 5 is provided so that the opening on the quartz plate side of the mask 3 is widened. In order to taper the opening cross section of the mask 3, for example, there are methods such as performing a step etching with a metal mask and combining etching and laser processing. As a result, the inclination from the end to the center of the resist can be variously controlled.

  The coating process of the present invention eliminates the direction of coating in screen printing by performing printing twice by reciprocating the squeegee in one coating. That is, as shown in the cross-sectional view of the resist coating method of the present invention in FIG. 3, first, the forward coating process is performed. As a result, a resist unfilled portion 7 occurs behind the mask opening in the application direction.

  Therefore, (b) the return coating process is performed subsequently. As a result, the resist is sufficiently filled in the resist unfilled portion 7 generated in the first application process. This operation solves the problem of insufficient control of the direction of resist application in the screen printing method, that is, the taper shape of the resist end. At this time, not only rolling the paste but also filling the mask by pressurizing the paste is effective.

  In the present invention, in order to further widen the taper of the resist end portion more gently, the resist application is performed a plurality of times while changing the opening area of the mask or the resist printing thickness. That is, as shown in a sectional view in FIG. 4, a second layer resist 2b is formed on the first layer resist 2a. At this time, by changing the area of the opening of the mask between the first resist application and the second resist application, the taper of the resist end can be made gently and wide.

  Changing not only the mask opening but also the resist thickness has a great effect on changing the taper of the resist end. In recoating, it is also effective to change the viscosity and thixotropy of the resist. In the mesh type screen mask, it is also effective to change the aperture ratio in consideration of the occupied area of the mesh.

  By performing resist coating a plurality of times in this way, it becomes possible to further change the thickness from the resist end, that is, the three-dimensional shape.

  In the screen printing method, the flat portion may wave, particularly in a mesh type mask. Therefore, it is preferable to flatten the portions other than the bevel after printing. Flattening can be performed by spraying or polishing a gas such as air. In this case, the use of warm air is effective in making the taper shape gentle by changing the viscosity and thixotropy.

  Further, as shown in a sectional view in FIG. 5, unnecessary etching can be prevented by previously providing an etching stop layer 6 such as a metal film on the crystal other than the bevel portion.

  As described above, the quartz base plate formed with resist as shown in FIG. 6A is beveled or convex shaped by any one of dry etching, wet etching, and blasting, and FIG. Are processed and separated into individual quartz crystal vibrating pieces as shown in FIG.

  The crystal vibrating piece 8 processed in this way is formed with a predetermined electrode in advance or with a predetermined electrode after processing, and is mounted on the package 10 with a bonding material 9 as shown in a sectional view in FIG. It becomes a crystal resonator.

  As described above, the AT-cut quartz resonator subjected to bevel processing or convex processing has excellent vibration characteristics that are not affected by parasitic vibration even in a small rectangular type.

It is sectional drawing which shows the resist application | coating process of this invention. It is sectional drawing which shows the mask of this invention. It is sectional drawing which shows the resist coating method of this invention. It is sectional drawing which shows the resist application state of this invention. It is sectional drawing which shows the resist application state of this invention. It is sectional drawing which shows the quartz base plate processing process of this invention. It is a figure which shows a crystal oscillator. It is a figure which shows an AT cut quartz crystal vibrating piece.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Crystal base plate 2 Resist 3 Mask 4 Squeegee 5 Taper 6 Etching prevention layer 7 Resist unfilled part 8 Crystal vibrating piece 9 Bonding material 10 Package

Claims (8)

Applying a resist film in a three-dimensional shape to the quartz base plate by screen printing;
Processing the cross section of the quartz base plate into a bevel or convex shape by etching or blasting; and
A method for producing a quartz crystal vibrating piece, comprising:   The method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to claim 1, wherein a cross section of an opening of a mask used in the screen printing method has a taper.   3. The method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to claim 1, wherein the applying step by the screen printing method applies the resist film by reciprocating at least once. 4.   2. The method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to claim 1, further comprising a step of recoating the resist film while changing at least one of an opening area of a mask used in the screen printing method or a thickness of the resist film. Method.   The method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the resist film contains a non-metallic inorganic substance.   The method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to claim 1, wherein the etching is dry etching.   The method for manufacturing a quartz crystal vibrating piece according to claim 1, wherein the etching is wet etching.   A crystal resonator having a crystal resonator element manufactured by the manufacturing method according to claim 1.

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