Abstract A mosaic of ultrasonic transducers is assembled and manufactured and adapted to the faceplate of an image conversion tube in a simple and expeditious procedure: a layer of piezoelectric material is joined to a layer of conductive syntactic foam preferably this is accomplished with a conductive epoxy material. The remaining side of the syntactic foam layer is then joined, suitably with conductive epoxy adhesive material, to the wire fiber optic faceplate of an image conversion tube. A plurality of spaced parallel slots are formed through the two layers of material and to a depth just into the tube faceplate, and a plurality of spaced parallel slots are formed perpendicular to the aforementioned slots in the piezoelectric and foam layers also to a depth just into the tube faceplate. The resulting configuration is a checkerboard mosaic of piezoelectric transducers which are spaced from each other, acoustically isolated from one another, and electrically coupled to individual wires in the tube faceplate. A novel result of this process permits substitution of other transducers to the faceplate of a conversion tube by simply scrapping off the old transducer and reforming the new mosaic on the tube faceplate in the same manner as described.
The method as defined in claim 1 wherein the step of slicing through said layers found comprises slicing a plurality of spaced slots in one direction and slicing a plurality of spaced slots perpendicular to the aforementioned slots to form a checkerboard mosaic.
Claim 2
Dependent Claim
34 words
The method as defined in claim 2 wherein the step of slicing through said piezoelectric and foam layers includes slicing to a depth sufficient to just penetrate the surface of the fiber electronics faceplate.
Claim 3
Independent Claim
161 words
The method of manufacturing an image conversion tube adapted to contain a mosaic of ultrasonic transducers comprising the steps of: a. joining together with conductive epoxy material a slab of piezoelectric material with the front side of slab of electrically conductive syntactic foam materiaL; b. joining together with conductive epoxy material the back side of said slab of foam material to a faceplate of an image conversion tube; said faceplate being of the type which contains a plurality of substantially uniformly spaced conductive wires insulated from one another which extend from the outside to the inside regions of said image conversion tube; c. slotting therethrough a plurality of spaced parallel slots in one direction and a second spaced plurality of slots in a direction perpendicular to said first direction; each of said slots being of sufficient depth so as to extend through both said piezoelectric and syntactic foam slabs and sufficient to penetrate slightly the faceplate of said image conversion tube.