The present invention relates to a cutting element comprising a substrate with at least one aperture which comprises a cutting edge along at least a por- tion of an inner perimeter of the aperture, wherein the cutting edges have an asymmetric cross-sectional shape with a first face, a second face opposed to the first face and a cutting edge at the intersection of the first face and the second face. Moreover, the present invention relates to a hair removal device comprising such cutting elements.

Conventional shaving razors contain a plurality of straight cutting edges aligned parallel to each other and these razors are moved in a direction per pendicular to the cutting edges over the user's skin to cut body hair. Typically, a handle is attached to the plurality of cutting edges at this perpendicular an- gle to facilitate easy operation of the razor. However, this limits these razors to being used only in this single perpendicular direction. Shaving in any other direction requires the user to change the orientation of the hand and arm holding the razor or to change the grip of the handle within the hand. As a re sult, it is possible to shave back and forth over the body surface but still lim ited to a direction that is perpendicular to the elements. Shaving sideways and in any other kind of motion, e.g. circular or in the shape of an "8" is very diffi cult.

It is also known that moving conventional straight cutting edges parallel to the skin result in slicing action that severely cuts the skin, because the skin bulges into the gaps between the cutting edges and hence is presented to the full length of the cutting edge as it moves parallel to the bulge (like cutting a to mato with a knife).

This can be overcome by providing a cutting element that comprises cutting edges that are shorter and surrounded on all sides by solid material to create cutting edges that are located on the inside perimeter of an aperture. An ar ray of such apertures containing cutting edges gives better support to the skin during shaving, flattens the skin and reduces bulging of the skin into the aper tures, which result in a much safer cutting element.

Furthermore, cutting edges that are located on the inside perimeter of aper tures only present a very short section of cutting edge that is parallel to any direction of motion and therefore considerably reduces the slicing action and risk of cutting the user's skin.

There is therefore a need for cutting elements and hair removal devices that can be used anywhere on the body's skin surface in any form of back and forth, sideways, circular, "8"-shaped or any other motion. For instance, it is easier and more natural to remove hair from under the arm in a circular mo tion. It is also easier not to be constraint to up and down shaving on some dif ficult to reach and hard to see areas of the body.

To enable multi-directional shaving, hair removal devices consisting of a sheet of material containing circular or other shaped apertures with cutting edges provided along the internal perimeter of these apertures have been previ ously proposed. However, fabricating these devices from sheets of e.g. metal requires the cutting edge to protrude from the plane of the sheet material and hence point towards the skin of the user (US 2004/0187644 Al, W02001/08856 Al, EP 0917934 Al, US5, 293,768 Bl). This causes severe is sues with the safety of these shaving devices and this is the reason for why no such devices are available on the market today.

To improve the safety and prevent the skin from being cut by the cutting edges, it has been proposed to fabricate apertures with cutting edges along the internal perimeter that do not protrude beyond the shaving surface by etching apertures with beveled edges along the internal perimeter into e.g. silicon wafers (US 7,124,511 Bl, JP 2004/141360 Al, EP 1 173 311 Al, DE 35 26951 Al).

It has been found that all silicon cutting edges, even with hard coatings such as DLC, are too brittle to provide for a durable shaving device, which is the reason that no such devices are available on the market today.

There is therefore a need to provide a cutting element and a hair removal de vice that can be used safely in a multi directional motion without much skin bulging into the apertures and with cutting edges that efficiently remove hair but not cut into the skin. This requires cutting edges along the internal perim eter of an array of apertures that lie within the plane of the array while having cutting edges with a bevel of less than 20° that is sufficiently durable to with stand frequent usage.

The present invention therefore addresses the problem to overcome the mentioned problems and to provide a cutting element which is efficient and safe to handle in multi-directional shaving, i.e. to cut the hair without cutting the skin.

This problem is solved by the cutting element with the features of claim 1 and the hair removal device with the features of claim 16. The further dependent claims define preferred embodiments of such a shaving device.

The term "comprising" in the claims and in the description of this application has the meaning that further components are not excluded. Within the scope of the present invention, the term "consisting of" should be understood as pre ferred embodiment of the term "comprising". If it is defined that a group "com prises" at least a specific number of components, this should also be under stood such that a group is disclosed which "consists" preferably of these com ponents.

In the following, the term cross-sectional view refers to a view of a slice through the cutting element perpendicular to the cutting edge (if the cutting edge is straight) or perpendicular to the tangent of the cutting edge (if the cutting edge is curved) and perpendicular to the surface of the substrate of the cutting ele ment.

The term intersecting line has to be understood as the linear extension of an intersecting point (according to a cross-sectional view as in Fig. 4) between dif ferent bevels regarding the perspective view (as in Fig. 3). As an example, if a straight bevel is adjacent to a straight bevel the intersecting point in the cross- sectional view is extended to an intersecting line in the perspective view.

According to the present invention a cutting element is provided which com prises a substrate with at least one aperture which comprises a cutting edge along at least a portion of an inner perimeter of the aperture, wherein the cutting edges have an asymmetric cross-sectional shape with a first face, a second face opposed to the first face and a cutting edge at the intersection of the first face and the second face.

The first face comprises a first surface.

The second face comprises a primary bevel, a secondary bevel and a tertiary bevel with

• the primary bevel extending from the cutting edge to the secondary bevel

• the secondary bevel extending from the primary bevel to the tertiary bevel

• a first intersecting line connecting the primary bevel and the sec ondary bevel, and • a second intersecting line connecting the secondary bevel and the tertiary bevel,

• a first wedge angle qi between the first surface and the primary bevel and

• a second wedge angle Q2 between the first surface and the sec ondary bevel and

• a third wedge angle Q ₃ between the first surface and the tertiary bevel.

It was surprisingly found that a cutting element with a very stable cutting edge combined with very good cutting performance can be provided when the wedge angles fulfill the following conditions: qi > 02 and/or Q2 < Q3.

The cutting elements according to the present invention have a low cutting force due to a thin secondary bevel with a small wedge angle.

The cutting elements according to the present invention are strengthened by adding a primary bevel with a primary wedge angle greater than the secondary wedge angle. The primary bevel with the first wedge angle 0i has therefore the function to stabilize the cutting edge mechanically against damage from the cutting operation which allows a slim element body in the area of the secondary bevel without affecting the cutting performance of the element.

Preferably, the substrate has a plurality of apertures, e.g. more than 5, prefer ably more than 10, more preferably more than 20 and even more preferably more than 50 apertures.

According to a preferred embodiment the cutting edge is shaped along the in ner perimeter of the apertures resulting in a circular cutting edge. However, according to another preferred embodiment the cutting edge is only shaped in portions of the inner perimeter of the apertures. The substrate of the inventive shaving device has preferably a thickness of 20 to 1000 pm, more preferably from 30 to 500 pm, and even more preferably 50 to 300 pm.

According to a preferred embodiment of the shaving device the substrate comprises a first material, more preferably essentially consists of or consists of the first material.

According to another preferred embodiment the substrate comprises a first and a second material which is arranged adjacent to the first material. More preferably, the substrate essentially consists of or consists of the first and sec ond material. The second material can be deposited as a coating at least in re gions of the first material, i.e. the second material can be an enveloping coat ing of the first material, or a coating deposited on the first material on the first face.

The material of the first material is in general not limited to any specific mate rial as long it is possible to bevel this material. It is preferred that the first ma terial is different from the second material, more preferably the second mate rial has a higher hardness and/or a higher modulus of elasticity and/or a higher rupture stress than the first material.

However, according to an alternative embodiment the blade body comprises or consists only of the first material, i.e. an uncoated first material. In this case, the first material is preferably a material with an isotropic structure, i.e. having identical values of a property in all directions. Such isotropic materials are often better suited for shaping, independent from the shaping technology.

The first material preferably comprises or consists of a material selected from the group consisting of

• metals, preferably titanium, nickel, chromium, niobium, tungsten, tan talum, molybdenum, vanadium, platinum, germanium, iron, and alloys thereof, in particular steel,

• ceramics comprising at least one element selected from the group con sisting of carbon, nitrogen, boron, oxygen and combinations thereof, preferably silicon carbide, zirconium oxide, aluminum oxide, silicon ni tride, boron nitride, tantalum nitride, AITiN, TiCN, TiAISiN, TiN, and/or TiB ₂ ,

• glass ceramics; preferably aluminum-containing glass-ceramics,

• composite materials made from ceramic materials in a metallic matrix (cermets),

• hard metals, preferably sintered carbide hard metals, such as tungsten carbide or titanium carbide bonded with cobalt or nickel,

• silicon or germanium, preferably with the crystalline plane parallel to the second face, wafer orientation <100>, <110>, <111> or <211>,

• single crystalline materials,

• glass or sapphire,

• polycrystalline or amorphous silicon or germanium,

• mono- or polycrystalline diamond, nano-crystalline and/or ultranano- cystalline diamond like carbon (DLC), adamantine carbon and

• combinations thereof.

The steels used for the first material are preferably selected from the group consisting of 1095, 12C27, 14C28N, 154CM, BCrlBMoV, 4034, 40X10C2M, 4116, 420, 440A, 440B, 440C, 5160, 5Crl5MoV, 8Crl3MoV, 95X18, 9Crl8MoV, Acuto+, ATS-34, AUS-4, AUS-6 (= 6A), AUS-8 (= 8A), C75, CPM-10V, CPM-3V, CPM-D2, CPM-M4, CPM-S-30V, CPM-S-35VN, CPM-S-60V, CPM-154, Cronidur- 30, CTS 204 P, CTS 20CP, CTS 40CP, CTS B52, CTS B75P, CTS BD-1, CTS BD-30P, CTS XHP, D2, Elmax, GIN-1, HI, N690, N695, Niolox (1.4153), Nitro-B, S70, SGPS, SK-5, Sleipner, T6M0V, VG-10, VG-2, X-15T.N., X50CrMoV15, ZDP-189.

It is preferred that the second material comprises or consists of a material se lected from the group consisting of • oxides, nitrides, carbides, borides, preferably aluminum nitride, chromium nitride, titanium nitride, titanium carbon nitride, ti tanium aluminum nitride, cubic boron nitride

• boron aluminum magnesium

• carbon, preferably diamond, poly-crystalline diamond, nano crystalline diamond, diamond like carbon (DLC), and

• combinations thereof.

The second material may be preferably selected from the group consisting of TiB , AITiN, TiAIN, TiAISiN, TiSiN, CrAI, CrAIN, AICrN, CrN, TiNJiCN and combi nations thereof.

Moreover, all materials cited in the VDI guideline 2840 can be chosen for the second material.

It is particularly preferred to use a second material of nano-crystalline diamond and/or multilayers of nano-crystalline and polycrystalline diamond as second material. Relative to monocrystalline diamond, it has been shown that produc tion of nano-crystalline diamond, compared to the production of monocrystal line diamond, can be accomplished substantially more easily and economically. Moreover, with respect to their grain size distribution nano-crystalline diamond layers are more homogeneous than polycrystalline diamond layers, the mate rial also shows less inherent stress. Consequently, macroscopic distortion of the cutting edge is less probable.

It is preferred that the second material has a thickness of 0.15 to 20 pm, pref erably 2 to 15 pm and more preferably 3 to 12 pm.

It is preferred that the second material has a modulus of elasticity (Young's modulus) of less than 1200 GPa, preferably less than 900 GPa, more preferably less than 750 GPa and even more preferably less than 500 GPa. Due to the low modulus of elasticity the hard coating becomes more flexible and more elastic. The Young ^' s modulus is determined according to the method as disclosed in Markus Mohr et al., "Youngs modulus, fracture strength, and Poisson ^' s ratio of nanocrystalline diamond films", J. Appl. Phys. 116, 124308 (2014), in particular under paragraph III. B. Static measurement of Young ^' s modulus.

The second material has preferably a transverse rupture stress oo of at least 1 GPa, more preferably of at least 2.5 GPa, and even more preferably at least 5 GPa.

With respect to the definition of transverse rupture stress oo, reference is made to the following literature references:

• R. Morrell et al., Int. Journal of Refractory Metals & Hard Materials, 28 (2010), p. 508 -515;

• R. Danzer et al. in "Technische keramische Werkstoffe", published by J. Kriegesmann, HvB Press, Ellerau, ISBN 978-3-938595-00-8, chapter 6.2.3.1 "Der 4-Kugelversuch zur Ermittlung der biaxialen Biegefestigkeit sproder Werkstoffe"

The transverse rupture stress oo is thereby determined by statistical evaluation of breakage tests, e.g. in the B3B load test according to the above literature details. It is thereby defined as the breaking stress at which there is a probability of breakage of 63%.

Due to the extremely high transverse rupture stress of the second material the detachment of individual crystallites from the hard coating, in particular from the cutting edge, is almost completely suppressed. Even with long-term use, the cutting blade therefore retains its original sharpness.

The second material has preferably a hardness of at least 20 GPa. The hardness is determined by nanoindentation (Yeon-Gil Jung et. al., J. Mater. Res., Vol. 19, No. 10, p. 3076).

The second material has preferably a surface roughness RRMS of less than 100 nm, more preferably less than 50 nm, and even more preferably less than 20 nm, which is calculated according to R RMS Z(x, y) ² dxdy

- ¾>//

A = evaluation area

Z(x,y) = the local roughness distribution

The surface roughness RRMS is determined according to DIN EN ISO 25178. The mentioned surface roughness makes additional mechanical polishing of the grown second material superfluous.

In a preferred embodiment, the second material has an average grain size dso of the nano-crystalline diamond of 1 to 100 nm, preferably 5 to 90 nm more preferably from 7 to 30 nm, and even more preferably 10 to 20 nm. The average grain size dso is the diameter at which 50% of the second material is comprised of smaller particles. The average grain size dso may be determined using X-ray diffraction or transmission electron microscopy and counting of the grains.

According to a preferred embodiment, the first material and/or the second material are coated at least in regions with a low-friction material, preferably selected from the group consisting of fluoropolymer materials like PTFE, parylene, polyvinylpyrrolidone, polyethylene, polypropylene, polymethyl methacrylate, graphite, diamond-like carbon (DLC) and combinations thereof.

The first intersecting line connecting the primary bevel and the secondary bevel is preferably shaped within the second material.

It is further preferred that the second intersecting line between secondary and tertiary bevel is arranged at the boundary surface of the first material and the second material which makes the process of manufacture easier to handle and therefore more economic, e.g. the blades can be manufactures according to the process of Fig. 9.

Moreover, the apertures have preferably a shape which is selected from the group consisting of circular, ellipsoidal, square, triangular, rectangular, trape zoidal, hexagonal, octagonal or combinations thereof. The area of an aperture is defined as the open area enclosed by the inner pe rimeter. The aperture area ranges preferably from 0.2 mm ² to 25 mm ² , more preferably from 1 mm ² to 15 mm ² , and even more preferably from 2 mm ² to 12 mm ² .

According to a first preferred embodiment, the first wedge angle qi ranges from 5° to 75°, preferably 10° to 60°, more preferably 15° to 46°, and even more preferably 20° to 45° and/or the second wedge angle 0 ₂ ranges from -10° to 40°, preferably 0° to 30°, more preferably 10° to 25° and/or the third wedge angle 0 ₃ ranges from 1° to 60°, preferably 10° to 55°, more preferably 19° to 46°, and even more preferably 20° to 45°.

According to a further preferred embodiment, the primary bevel has a length di being the dimension projected onto the first surface taken from the cutting edge to the first intersecting line from 0.1 to 7 pm, preferably from 0.5 to 5 pm, and more preferably 1 to 3 pm. A length di < 0.1 pm is difficult to pro duce since an edge of such length is too fragile and would not allow a stable use of the cutting element. It has been surprisingly found that the primary bevel stabilizes the element body with the secondary and tertiary bevel which allows a slim element in the area of the secondary bevel which offers a low cutting force. On the other hand, the primary bevel does not affect the cutting performance as long as the length di is not larger than 7 pm.

Preferably, the length d2 being the dimension projected onto the first surface and/or the imaginary extension of the first surface taken from the cutting edge to the second intersecting line ranges from 5 to 150 pm, preferably from 10 to 100 pm, and more preferably from 20 to 80 pm. The length d2 corre sponds to the penetration depth of the cutting element in the object to be cut. In general, d2 corresponds to at least 30% of the diameter of the object to be cut, i.e. when the object is human hair which typically has a diameter of around 100 pm the length d2 is at least 30 pm. The cutting elements according to the present invention have therefore a low cutting force due to a thin sec ondary bevel with a low second wedge angle 02. The cutting edge micro geometry ideally has a round configuration which im proves the stability of the element. The cutting edge has preferably a tip ra dius of less than 200 nm, more preferably less than 100 nm and even more preferably less than 50 nm.

It is preferred that the tip radius r is coordinated to the average grain size dso of the hard coating. It is hereby advantageous in particular if the ratio be tween the tip radius r of the second material at the cutting edge and the aver age grain size dso of the nanocrystalline diamond hard coating r/dso is from 0.03 to 20, preferably from 0.05 to 15, and particularly preferred from 0.5 to 10.

According to a further preferred embodiment, the first face comprises a qua ternary bevel with

• a third intersecting line connecting the quaternary bevel and the first surface

• the quaternary bevel extending from the cutting edge to the third intersecting line

• a fourth wedge angle 0 ₄ between the imaginary extension of the first surface and the quaternary bevel.

The cutting element according to the present invention may be used in the field of hair or skin removal, e.g. shaving, dermaplaning, callus skin removal, but also in other fields where cutting elements are used, e.g. as a kitchen knife, vegetable peeler, slicer, wood shaver, scalpel and composite fiber mate rial cutter.

According to the present invention also a hair removal device comprising at least one cutting element as described above is provided.

The present invention is further illustrated by the following figures which show specific embodiments according to the present invention. However, these spe cific embodiments shall not be interpreted in any limiting way with respect to the present invention as described in the claims and in the general part of the specification. FIG. la is a perspective view of a cutting element in accordance with the pre sent invention

FIG. lb is a top view onto the second surface of a cutting element in accord ance with the present invention

FIG. lc is a perspective view onto the first face of a cutting element in ac cordance with the present invention

Fig. 2 is a top view onto the second surface of a cutting element in accord ance with the present invention

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a cutting element in accordance with the pre sent invention

FIG. 4 is a top view onto the second surface of a cutting element in accord ance with the present invention

FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view of a cutting element in accordance with the present invention

FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view of a further cutting element in accordance with the present invention

FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional view of a further cutting element in accordance with the present invention

FIG. 8 is a cross-sectional view of a further cutting element in accordance with the present invention

FIG. 9 is a cross-sectional view of a further cutting element in accordance with the present invention with an additional bevel on the first face

FIG. lOa-b is a flow chart of the process for manufacturing the cutting elements Fig. 11 is a schematic cross-sectional view of the cutting edge micro geome try showing the determination of the tip radius

Fig. 12 is a microscopic SEM image of a cutting blade according to the cutting element according to Fig. 7

The following reference signs are used in the figures of the present application.

Reference sign list

1 cutting element

2 first face

3 second face

4, 4 ^' , 4 ^" , 4 ^"' cutting edges

5 primary bevel

6 secondary bevel

7 tertiary bevel

8 quaternary bevel

9 first surface 9 ^' imaginary extension of the first surface

10 first intersecting line 11 second intersecting line 12 third intersecting line

15 element body

16 cutting wedge 18 first material

19 second material

20 boundary surface 22 substrate 60 tip bisecting line 61 perpendicular line 62 circle

65 construction point

66 construction point 67 construction point

70, 71 straight portions of aperture 72 curved portion of aperture

73 first section

74 second section

75 linear cutting edge extension

76 tangent to cutting edge

77 cross-sectional line

78 cross-sectional line

260 bisecting line

430 aperture

431 inner perimeter of aperture

432 aperture area

Fig. la shows a cutting element of the present invention in a perspective view. The cutting element with a first face 2 and second face 3 comprises a substrate 22 of a first material 18 with an aperture 430. At the first face 2 the substrate 22 has its first surface 9 with an inner perimeter431 of the aperture 430. In this embodiment, the cutting edge 4 is shaped along the inner perimeter 431 re sulting in a circular cutting edge 4.

Fig. lb is a top view on the second face 3 of the cutting element. The substrate 22 has an aperture 430 with an inner perimeter 431 and an aperture area 432. The substrate comprises a first material 18 and a second material 19 (partially visible in this perspective) wherein the cutting edge is shaped along the inner perimeter 431 and in the second material 19.

Fig. lc is a perspective view onto the first face 2 of the cutting element which shows the second material 19 having an aperture with an inner perimeter 431.

Fig. 2 is a top view onto the second face 3 of a cutting element of the present invention. The cutting element with a first face 2 (not visible in this perspective) and a second face 3 comprises a substrate 22 of a first material 18 with an ap erture 430 having the shape of an octagon. At the first face 2 (not visible in this perspective), the substrate 22 has its first surface 9 with an inner perimeter 431 of the aperture 430. In this embodiment, the cutting edges 4, 4 ^' , 4 ^" , 4 ^"' are shaped only in portions of the inner perimeter 431, i.e. every second side of the octagon has a cutting edge. Fig. 3 is a perspective view of the cutting element according to the present in vention. This cutting element 1 has an element body 15 which comprises a first face 2 and a second face 3 which is opposed to the first face 2. At the intersec tion of the first face 2 and the second face 3 a cutting edge 4 is located. The cutting edge 4 has curved portions. The first face 2 comprises a plane first sur face 9 while the second face 3 is segmented in different bevels. The second face 3 comprises a primary bevel 5, secondary bevel 6 and a tertiary bevel 7. The primary bevel 5 is connected via a first intersecting line 10 with the secondary bevel 6 which on the other end is connected to the tertiary bevel 7 via a second intersecting line 11.

Fig. 4 is a top view onto the second surface of a cutting element and illustrates what is meant by the cross-section within the scope of the present invention. The substrate 22 has an aperture 430 shaped with a cutting edge 16 with two straight portions 70, 71 and one curved portion 72 where the cutting edges are shaped. In the first section 74 of the straight portion 71 the slice goes through the substrate 22 perpendicular to the linear cutting edge extension 75 corre sponding to the cross-sectional line 78. In the second section 73 of the curved portion 72 the slice goes through the substrate 22 perpendicular to the tangent of the cutting edge 76 corresponding to the cross-sectional line 77.

In Fig. 5, the cross-sectional view of the cutting blade of Fig. 3 is shown.

In Fig. 6, a cross-sectional view of a further cutting element of the present in vention shown which corresponds largely to the cross-sectional view of Fig. 5 with the only difference that the wedge angle qi of the primary bevel 5 is equal to the wedge angle Q2 of the secondary bevel 6 with the consequence that the primary bevel 5 and the secondary bevel 6 have the same gradient.

In Fig. 7, a further cross-sectional view of the cutting blade according to the present invention is shown. This cutting blade 1 has a blade body 15 which com prises a first face 2 and a second face 3 which is opposed to the first face 2. At the intersection of the first face 2 and the second phase 3 a cutting edge 4 is located. The first face 2 comprises a planar first surface 9 while the second face 3 is segmented in different bevels. The second face 3 of the cutting blade 1 has a primary bevel 5 with a first wedge angle qi between the first surface 9 and the primary bevel 5. The secondary bevel 6 has a second wedge angle Q2 be tween the first surface 9 and the secondary bevel 6 with a bisecting line 260 of the secondary wedge angle Q2. Q2 is smaller than qi. The tertiary bevel 7 has a third wedge angle Q3 which is larger than Q2. The primary bevel 5 has a length di being the dimension projected onto the first surface 9 which is in the range from 0.1 to 7 pm. The primary bevel 5 and the secondary bevel 6 together have a length d2 being the dimension projected onto the first surface 9 which is in the range from 5 to 150 pm, preferably from 10 to 100 pm, and more preferably from 20 to 80 pm.

In Fig. 8, a further cross-sectional view of a cutting blade of the present inven tion is shown where the blade body 15 comprises a first material 18, e.g. silicon, with a second material 19, e.g. a diamond layer on the first material 18 at the first face 2. The primary bevel 5 and secondary bevel 6 are located in the second material 19 while the tertiary bevel 7 is located in the first material 18. The first material 18 and the second material 19 are joined along a boundary surface 20.

Fig. 9 shows a further cross-sectional view of an embodiment according to the present invention of a cutting blade 1 with a first face 2 and a second face 3. The second face 3 has a primary bevel 5, a secondary bevel 6 and a tertiary bevel 7. On the first face 2 between the surface 9 and the cutting edge 4, a further quaternary bevel 8 is located. The angle between the quaternary bevel 8 and theimaginary extension of the first surface 9 ^' is Q4. The wedge angle Q2 between the primary bevel 5 and the surface 9 is smaller than the wedge angle qi between the secondary bevel 6 and the surface 9. Moreover, the wedge an gle Q3 between the tertiary bevel 7 and the surface 9 is larger than Q2.

In Fig. 10 a flow chart of the inventive process is shown. In a first step 1, a silicon wafer 101 is coated by PE-CVD or thermal treatment (low pressure CVD) with a silicon nitride (S N-i) layer 102 as protection layerforthe silicon. The layerthick ness and deposition procedure must be chosen carefully to enable sufficient chemical stability to withstand the following etching steps. In step 2, a photo resist 103 is deposited onto the S13N4 coated substrate and subsequently pat terned by photolithography. The (S13N4) layer is then structured by e.g. CF4- plasma reactive ion etching (RIE) using the patterned photoresist as mask. After patterning, the photoresist 103 is stripped by organic solvents in step 3. The remaining, patterned S1 ₃ N ₄ layer 102 serves as a mask for the following pre structuring step 4 of the silicon wafer 101 e.g. by anisotropic wet chemical etch ing in KOH. The etching process is ended when the structures on the second face 3 have reached a predetermined depth and a continuous silicon first face 2 remains. Alternatively, other wet and dry chemical processes may be suited, e.g. isotropic wet chemical etching in HF/HNO ₃ solutions or the application of fluorine containing plasmas. In the following step 5, the remaining S1 ₃ N ₄ is re moved by, e.g. hydrofluoric acid (HF) or fluorine plasma treatment. In step 6, the pre-structured Si-substrate is coated with an approx. 10 pm thin diamond layer 104, e.g. nano-crystalline diamond. The diamond layer 104 can be depos ited onto the pre-structured second surface 3 and the continuous first surface 2 of the Si-wafer 101 (as shown in step 6) or only on the continuous fist surface 2 of the Si-wafer (not shown here). In the case of double-sided coating, the di amond layer 104 on the structured second surface 3 has to be removed in a further step 7 prior to the following edge formation steps 9-11 of the cutting blade. The selective removal of the diamond layer 104 is performed e.g. by us ing an Ar/0 ₂ -plasma (e.g. RIE or ICP mode), which shows a high selectivity to wards the silicon substrate. In step 8, the silicon wafer 101 is thinned so that the diamond layer 104 is partially free standing without substrate material and the desired substrate thickness is achieved in the remaining regions. This step can be performed by wet chemical etching in KOH or HF/HNO ₃ etchants or pref erably by plasma etching in CF ₄ , SF ₆ , or CHF ₃ containing plasmas in RIE or ICP mode. Adding O ₂ to the plasma process will yield in a cutting edge formation of the diamond film (as shown in step 9). Process details are disclosed for instance in DE 19859905 Al.

In Fig. 11, it is shown how the tip radius can be determined. The tip radius is determined by first drawing a tip bisecting line 60 bisecting the cross-sectional image of the first bevel of the cutting edge 1 in half. Where the tip bisecting line 60 bisects the first bevel point 65 is drawn. A second line 61 is drawn per pendicular to the tip bisecting line 60 at a distance of 100 nm from point 65. Where line 61 bisects the first bevel two additional points 66 and 67 are drawn. A circle 62 is then constructed from points 65, 66 and 67. The radius of circle 62 is the tip radius for the cutting element.