We studied the supply and removal of oil to and from a thin groove and the consequent insertion loss, aiming at matrix optical waveguide switches that utilize optical reflection and transmission effects at the groove. A robot precisely controlled the position of the removal nozzle and the supply needle by a vision servo. The optimum position for the removal nozzle was at the entrance of the groove to a circular oil pool, and the positioning margin was 10-15µm around the optimum position. The on-off ratio of the switching light power at the optimum position was about 30dB. The removal time was proportional to the kinetic viscosity of the oil, and the optimum height of the removal nozzle was independent of the kinetic viscosity of the oil. An analysis of the insertion loss revealed that the main factor in the loss at the reflection is the tilt of the groove wall.

A new self-holding optical switch that consists of an optical matrix board and a precision robot is proposed. Fabrication and evaluation of 33 optical matrix boards confirm the feasibility of large-size optical switching. Suppressing deviations in the groove position will realize lower loss optical matrix boards in the near future. The apparent roughness of the groove walls can be evaluated simply and effectively by measuring return loss with an interferometric optical-time-domain reflectometer.