Structure design and fabrication of symmetric force-balance micromachining capacitive accelerometer

A novel KOH silicon maskless anisotropic etching technology is adopted to fabricate micromachining silicon mass-beam structure accelerometer. Lateral sensitivity effect in normal accelerometer is eliminated because the beams which are thinner than 15 micrometers have been formed in the middle of the seismic mass. Based on the calculation of sensitivity and basic resonance frequency of two kinds of bulk micromachining accelerometers, the structure parameters of cantilever and double-side-supported accelerometer have been optimized by using the sensitivity-frequency product as the figure of merit of a structure. The different etching characteristics of {311} and {100} plane of silicon in KOH maskless anisotropic etching process have been investigated thoroughly and utilized in the fabrication of symmetric mass- beam structure. Special damping design has been proposed to reduce the damping ratio of the device in order to improve the dynamic performance of the accelerometer. Preliminary measurement of the static characteristics of the structure has been performed with a force-deflection balance measurement apparatus.