Touch Panel Projection Layer Air Gap Maintenance
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Solution Overview
Problem
Touch panels with air gaps between the panel and a display section face challenges in maintaining clearance, leading to potential contact and visibility issues, which affect image display quality and restrict device thinness.
Innovation Solution
A transparent touch panel with a projection formation layer having fine projections on its back surface, dispersed at specific densities and heights, to prevent contact with the display section and maintain a clear air gap, ensuring the region of contact is not conspicuous and allowing for a thinner apparatus.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If a clearance is provided between the touch panel and the display section to avoid contact, then image display quality is improved, but the apparatus thickness increases
Solution Approach 1:
The invention applies a projection formation layer with micro-protrusions on the back surface of the touch panel. These protrusions create a curved/irregular surface profile that prevents contact between the touch panel and display section while maintaining a thin overall structure. The micro-protrusions effectively convert a flat surface into a three-dimensional structured surface that achieves the clearance function without increasing apparent thickness.
Solution Approach 2:
The projection formation layer is implemented as a thin film structure (3-10 μm thick) that provides the necessary mechanical compliance and structural function. This thin film with integrated protrusions maintains the flexibility and thinness requirements while achieving the contact prevention function that would otherwise require a much thicker air gap.
2Reliability
If the touch panel is pressed or warped during use, then the clearance is compromised and contact occurs, but increasing the initial clearance to prevent contact restricts apparatus thinness
Solution Approach 1:
The projection formation layer acts as a pre-formed mechanical cushion that prevents contact before it can occur. The micro-protrusions are designed with specific height (0.5-2.0 μm) and density (10-100 per mm²) to provide adequate clearance even when the touch panel is pressed or warped during use, eliminating the need for a larger initial clearance gap.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the surface geometry parameters of the touch panel back surface by forming micro-protrusions with controlled dimensions. By adjusting the protrusion height (0.5-2.0 μm) and density (10-100 per mm²), the design optimizes the balance between maintaining reliable clearance under pressure and minimizing overall apparatus thickness.
Data Source
AI summary
Provided is a touch panel and a film body, which ensure that a region where the touch panel and a display section are in contact with each other is hard to be conspicuous and that an apparatus formed by the touch panel and a display device can be made thinner. The touch panel is a transparent touch panel which is disposed with air gaps provided at predetermined intervals between the transparent touch panel and a surface of a display section of a display device, wherein a back surface of the transparent touch panel facing the surface of the display section is provided with a projection formation layer on which a plurality of fine projections protruding toward the surface side of the display section are dispersively formed, the surface of the projection formation layer is configured to have an average irregularity height (Ra) of equal to or more than 0.01 μm and equal to or less than 0.06 μm and a maximum irregularity height (Ry) of equal to or more than 0.15 μm and equal to or less than 0.70 μm, and the projections having a height of equal to or more than 0.1 μm are dispersed with a density of equal to or more than 100 and equal to or less than 180 per 1 mm2.