Design and fabrication of a micromachined gyroscope with high shock resistance

Abstract

In this paper, a tuning fork gyroscope designed for high-g shock environments is presented. This micro gyroscope with 10 kHz designed working frequency is composed of double symmetrical frame structures that are connected by middle coupling beams. Two level elastic stoppers were designed in order to improve the shock resistance of the gyroscope. Slots were etched to reduce damping in the inner bonding regions. By bulk silicon micromachining technology, the gyroscope was fabricated on a 300 μm thickness silicon wafer. The working frequencies of the gyroscope on the driving and sensing modes are 10,240 and 11,160 Hz, respectively. Shock experiments to bare chips indicate that the shock resistance of the gyroscope along X-axis is 15,000 g, Y-axis is 14,000 g and Z-axis is 11,000 g.