Development of Direct Surface Forming Process

The backlight unit(BLU) is used as a light source of TFT liquid-crystalline-display (TFT-LCD) module. In this backlight unit, one of important components is the light guide, which is usually made of transparent polymers. Currently the screen-printing method is mainly used for the light guide as a manufacturing process. However, it has limitation to the flexibility of three-dimensional optical design. In the present paper a new alternative manufacturing method for the light guide with low-cost is proposed. This manufacturing method is named as direct surface forming (DSF), which is very similar to the well-known hot embossing except for partial contact between mold and substrate. The results of this new manufacturing method are presented in terms of processing condition, dimensional accuracy, productivity, etc.