Abstract
Suitable mold materials are critical for successful high volume replication of micro optical components. As one of the emerging new materials, bulk metallic glass (BMG) can serve as high-quality mold material to overcome the existing changelings with current mold materials. Zr-based BMG does not have the intrinsic structural defects and can be precisely formed into desired shape at elevated temperature. Therefore, the unique combination of good forming ability at elevated temperature and sufficient strength at working temperature make it perfect as high quality mold material for optics fabrication. This paper investigated the fabrication and use of BMG mold inserts to create micro optics on polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) substrate. BMG mold inserts were replicated from a fused silica master mold using precision glass molding techniques. The molded BMG inserts with optical features were used next as secondary molds to manufacture of polymer micro optics. High volume production methods, i.e., hot embossing and injection molding, are investigated. In order to evaluate the performance of BMG inserts, the geometry of the gratings on PMMA part were verified with fused silica master mold and BMG inserts using a non-contact profilometer. In addition, an instrument designed to measure surface scattering was used to measure the light distribution from the gratings. By using this process, high performance and BMG mold inserts for hot embossing and injection molding can be prepared cost-effectively for high volume production of plastic micro optical components.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Ashby MF, Greer AL (2006) Metallic glasses as structural materials. Scr Mater 54:321–326. doi:10.1016/j.scriptamat.2005.09.051
Barbero DR, Saifullah MSM, Hoffmann P et al (2007) High-resolution nanoimprinting with a robust and reusable polymer mold. Adv Funct Mater 17:2419–2425. doi:10.1002/adfm.200600710
Chen Y, Yi AY, Su L et al (2008) Numerical simulation and experimental study of residual stresses in compression molding of precision glass optical components. J Manuf Sci Eng 130:051012–051019. doi:10.1115/1.2950062
Chu JP, Wijaya H, Wu CW et al (2007) Nanoimprint of gratings on a bulk metallic glass. Appl Phys Lett 90:034101. doi:10.1063/1.2431710
Firestone GC, Yi AY (2005) Precision compression molding of glass microlenses and microlens arrays–an experimental study. Appl Opt 44:6115–6122. doi:10.1364/AO.44.006115
He P, Wang F, Li L et al (2011) Development of a low cost high precision fabrication process for glass hybrid aspherical diffractive lenses. J Opt 13:085703. doi:10.1088/2040-8978/13/8/085703
He P, Li L, Yu J et al (2013) Graphene-coated Si mold for precision glass optics molding. Opt Lett 38:2625–2628. doi:10.1364/OL.38.002625
He P, Li L, Li H et al (2014) Compression molding of glass freeform optics using diamond machined silicon mold. Manuf Lett 2:17–20. doi:10.1016/j.mfglet.2013.12.002
Hendrickx N, Van Erps J, Bosman E et al (2008) Embedded micromirror inserts for optical printed circuit boards. IEEE Photonics Technol Lett 20:1727–1729. doi:10.1109/LPT.2008.2004563
Hersam MC, Guisinger NP, Lyding JW (2000) Silicon-based molecular nanotechnology. Nanotechnology 11:70. doi:10.1088/0957-4484/11/2/306
Husu H, Saastamoinen T, Laukkanen J et al (2014) Scatterometer for characterization of diffractive optical elements. Meas Sci Technol 25:044019. doi:10.1088/0957-0233/25/4/044019
Johnson WL (1998) Bulk glass-forming metallic alloys: science and technology. MRS Online Proc Libr. doi:10.1557/PROC-554-311
Kumar G, Tang HX, Schroers J (2009) Nanomoulding with amorphous metals. Nature 457:868–872. doi:10.1038/nature07718
Li Z (2013) On-chip optofluidic grating spectrograph for biomedical applications. p 88450P–88450P–6
Pan CT, Wu TT, Chen MF et al (2008) Hot embossing of micro-lens array on bulk metallic glass. Sens Actuators Phys 141:422–431. doi:10.1016/j.sna.2007.10.040
Psaltis D, Quake SR, Yang C (2006) Developing optofluidic technology through the fusion of microfluidics and optics. Nature 442:381–386. doi:10.1038/nature05060
Schroers J (2005) The superplastic forming of bulk metallic glasses. JOM 57:35–39. doi:10.1007/s11837-005-0093-2
Wang X, Wang L, Jiang W, Chen RT (2007) Hard-molded 51 cm long waveguide array with a 150 GHz bandwidth for board-level optical interconnects. Opt Lett 32:677–679. doi:10.1364/OL.32.000677
Webpage A (2014a) AISI A6 Alloy Tool Steel (Air-Tough). http://www.matweb.com/search/DataSheet.aspx?MatGUID=357e6565d37846b38c933de3258ab5b8
Webpage P (2014b) Polycarbonate: OQ1022 Datasheet. http://www.cxj-dg.com/UploadFiles/PC/Media/Lexan%20Resin%20OQ1022.pdf
Webpage P (2014c) PMMA: Plexiglass V825 Datasheet. http://catalog.ides.com/Datasheet.aspx?I=60955&E=125499
Webpage P (2014d) Polystyrene Tech Blog. http://megamould.com/TechBlog/Mold-Design/Polystyrene%20Injection%20Process.html
Yi AY, Chen Y, Klocke F et al (2006) A high volume precision compression molding process of glass diffractive optics by use of a micromachined fused silica wafer mold and low Tg optical glass. J Micromech Microeng 16:2000–2005. doi:10.1088/0960-1317/16/10/012
Yu W, France DM, Smith DS et al (2009) Heat transfer to a silicon carbide/water nanofluid. Int J Heat Mass Transf 52:3606–3612. doi:10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2009.02.036
Zhang N, Byrne CJ, Browne DJ, Gilchrist MD (2012) Towards nano-injection molding. Mater Today 15:216–221. doi:10.1016/S1369-7021(12)70092-5
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
He, P., Li, L., Wang, F. et al. Bulk metallic glass mold for high volume fabrication of micro optics. Microsyst Technol 22, 617–623 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00542-014-2395-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00542-014-2395-1