Patent ID: 6862795

Claim:
A method of manufacturing a monolithic silicon acceleration sensor comprising the step of forming at least one silicon acceleration sensor cell, the step of forming a sensor cell comprising the steps of: (a) forming a layered sandwich of an etch-stop layer between a first wafer section of electrically conductive silicon having an exposed first surface and a second wafer section of electrically conductive silicon having an exposed second surface; (b) forming a second section of a movable silicon inertial mass by etching a rectangular frame-shaped channel in the second wafer section of silicon from the exposed second surface extending to the etch-stop layer; (c) forming a first section of the movable silicon inertial mass by etching a U-shaped channel and a bar-shaped channel in the first wafer section of silicon from the exposed first surface extending to the etch-stop layer, positioning the bar-shaped channel and the U-shaped channel in the first wafer section of silicon to be in horizontal alignment with, and of equal planar dimensions to the rectangular frame-shaped channel in the second wafer section of silicon; (d) stripping the etch-stop layer that is exposed by the etched frame-shaped channel, the etched U-shaped channel, and the etched bar-shaped channel, thereby creating a rectangular parallel piped-shaped inertial mass having a first and a second exposed surface, the parallel piped-shaped inertial mass positioned by beam members fixed to a silicon support structure having a first and a second exposed surface; and (e) providing a means for detecting movement of the parallel piped-shaped inertial mass.