JP2002033370A - Vacuum processing equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] [Problem] To obtain a compact device by integrating a sample mounting table and a gate of a vacuum processing chamber and obtaining an arrangement with a vacuum robot arm that minimizes the gap. Provided is a vacuum processing apparatus capable of minimizing energy required for operation and energy required for operation. SOLUTION: The figure shows a cross section of the apparatus of the present invention by a line connecting the center of a load lock chamber, the center of an intermediate chamber, and the center of a vacuum processing chamber, and a load lock chamber 70 (the same applies to an unload lock chamber). The load gate valve 71 is closed, the lock chamber stage 72 is raised, and the load lock space is
With the space of the intermediate chamber 2 shielded, the vacuum robot 200
This shows a state in which a sample W for vacuum processing is about to be transferred to the sample mounting table 102. At this time, the first arm 202 is brought close to the sample mounting table 102 to a limit value of a range that does not interfere in the horizontal direction, and the gate flange 102a of the sample mounting table 102 is vertically moved,
By arranging close to the limit value that does not interfere,
The distance between the center of the vacuum robot 200 and the center of the processing chamber can be minimized.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention has a vacuum chamber for forming and etching a semiconductor substrate, a liquid crystal substrate, a thin film for a magnetic head, and the like using plasma, heat, and the like. For all vacuum processing equipment.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A similar technique in a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus will be described with reference to two documents. The two documents are as follows. U.S. Patent Patent Num
ber 5, 292, 393 "MULTICHAMBER INTEGURATED PROCESS S
YSTEM "(hereinafter abbreviated as Document 1), JP-A-7-23
5394, "Plasma generation method and apparatus and plasma processing method and apparatus using the same" (ibid., Reference 2).

[0003] Document 1 is an apparatus generally called a multi-chamber, and has a plurality of processing chambers for processing a substrate.
The processing performed in each processing chamber may be the same or different, depending on the case, and both can be applied. A plurality of processing chambers and wafers as one of the processing substrates in the processing chambers are supplied to each processing chamber using a combination of an external cassette elevator and a wafer elevator provided inside the apparatus. The means are described in detail. As seen in the literature 1, many multi-chamber systems use a gate valve in a path for transferring a substrate (wafer) to a correlated vacuum chamber, and separate each vacuum chamber from each other.

The gate valve has an opening slightly larger than the substrate to be transferred, and the opening is often formed linearly.
As described in Document 1, there are gate valves that use the vacuum chamber itself as a valve seat, and gate valves that constitute an independent gate valve by pairing a valve seat and a valve body. Document 2 describes an effective means for generating microwaves with high density plasma. At the same time, there is a description of a gate valve having a cylindrical shape as a modified type of the gate valve, but sufficient consideration is not given to arranging the vacuum processing chamber with a minimum dimension.

[0005]

The prior arts described above are representative of currently used devices, and each has its own features. It cannot be said that sufficient consideration has been given at each time, such as at the time of manufacture, at the time of operation, or at the end of the life of the apparatus. When considering a vacuum device, the fact that the device is large means that it uses a lot of materials (resources), and also uses a lot of energy in a machine tool in processing. Having a large vacuum chamber means that more power is required to evacuate the chamber, and furthermore, in a room that uses plasma or the like, the input power is higher and more gas is consumed.

[0006] In addition, when cleaning is performed by opening the apparatus (breaking the vacuum) for periodic inspections and the like, the cleaning range is wide and time-consuming waste occurs. Will be. More specifically, by reducing the size of the robot arm, the inertial force when driving the robot arm is reduced, and the drive motor needs to be small and low power, and the size of the correlated vacuum chambers can be reduced. Therefore, the time for transferring the substrate can be shortened, the throughput can be improved, and even when the apparatus is transported, a smaller transport vehicle can be used. There are numerous advantages, such as the ease of operation.

[0007] In the prior art as well, when making a system, miniaturization is taken up as one of the issues and is an item that is always considered, but it has not always achieved a sufficient effect. In both of the above-mentioned Documents 1 and 2, a gate valve is disposed in the middle of transferring a wafer, and it cannot be said that sufficient consideration is given to the fact that this increases the size of the apparatus.

Further, in recent years, the demand for miniaturization of processing in a vacuum processing apparatus has become more and more severe, and when a part of the substrate comes into contact with another member, it becomes a source of dust. Is required.

[0009] In many apparatuses called a multi-chamber system, as shown in Document 1, a portion corresponding to an intermediate chamber and a vacuum processing chamber are formed of separate members and connected using a fastening member such as a bolt. Although the method is generally used, when processing an article, it is impossible to process the article with a tolerance of 0, even if the accuracy is increased.

Accordingly, when the vacuum chamber is arranged by combining a plurality of members, the positional accuracy is reduced by that amount, and adjustment work such as the amount of expansion and contraction of the robot arm, the rotation angle, etc., becomes necessary. Become. In addition, fine foreign matter generated in a vacuum space is not likely to be affected by air resistance, so it is highly likely to be radiated in a form that is almost straight ahead (because of the influence of gravity,
(Strictly speaking, it is not straight ahead.) In order to reduce the influence of dust generation due to contact opening and closing of the gate, it is better not to look down on the surface of the substrate from the position where the gate contacts.

In view of these problems, the present invention makes the apparatus as compact as possible and uses resources effectively.
The purpose is to provide a device that can minimize the energy required in the entire process from production to disposal, and in addition, the position of the vacuum chamber as a device can be uniquely determined without accumulating the processing tolerance of the components. The purpose of the present invention is to provide an ideal device which does not cause a dimensional deviation by determining its position.

[0012]

The minimum size of the center-to-center distance between two vacuum chambers that need to be independently separated is, to a maximum, the same as the size of the substrate to be processed. Is a case where both the wall size and the gate valve size for making them independent are set to 0, which is not practical in practice. In an actual device, the thickness of the partition wall capable of maintaining the vacuum and the size of the gate valve are added.

In the present invention, attention is paid to the fact that the reduction of the size between the vacuum chambers is restricted by the gate valve (also called a gate valve) between the chambers, and the structure and size of the gate valve are considered. The arrangement of the vacuum chamber which is not directly influenced by the above-mentioned conditions can obtain the minimum apparatus. The vacuum robot is composed of an arm portion and a wand portion, but only a wand portion vertically overlaps on a substrate mounting table that forms a vacuum processing chamber and holds and holds a substrate during vacuum processing. The stepped arm is as close as possible to the substrate mounting table, which is the member for mounting and holding the substrate.However, by positioning it so that there is a gap, the distance between the vacuum robot and the vacuum chamber should be minimized. Can be.

The intermediate chamber is preferably made of an aluminum alloy or the like so as to have an integral structure. If possible, it is good to use a plate material widely used in the market, but depending on the size, a material having dimensions that cannot be manufactured with the current equipment may be required. In this case, a desired shape can be obtained by cutting using a slab material or the like, but from the viewpoint of minimum use of energy, this method of generating a large amount of chips is not preferable. In this case, it is proposed to combine ready-made plate materials and combine them by friction welding. Other methods of joining require additional energy to correct distortion, remove burns, and the like.

[0015]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. The equipment is a cassette station 50, an atmospheric robot 6
0, load lock chamber 70, unload lock chamber 80, intermediate chamber 2, vacuum robot 200, vacuum processing chambers 100a, 1
00b and the like. Auxiliary equipment such as a vacuum pump for generating a vacuum, utilities, control equipment, and the like are necessary as constituent elements, but detailed description is omitted because there is no direct relation to the present invention.

FIG. 1 shows an example to which the present invention is applied, in which two chambers 100a and 100b are provided as vacuum processing chambers. Although three cassette stations 50 are illustrated, any number of cassette stations may be used. In addition, a wafer centering mechanism and an orientation flat (notch) position detection function may be provided.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view of the apparatus according to the present invention, taken along a line connecting the center of the load lock chamber, the center of the intermediate chamber, and the center of the vacuum processing chamber, and shows the load lock chamber 70 (the same applies to the unload lock chamber). , The load gate valve 71 is closed, the lock chamber stage 72 is raised, and the load lock space and the space of the intermediate chamber 2 are shielded.
This shows a state in which a sample W for vacuum processing is about to be transferred to the sample mounting table 102.

At this time, the first arm 202 is brought close to the sample mounting table 102 to a limit value within a range that does not interfere in the horizontal direction, and does not interfere with the gate flange 102a of the sample mounting table 102 in the vertical direction. By arranging them closer to the limit value, the distance between the center of the vacuum robot 200 and the center of the processing chamber can be minimized.

That is, since the gate of the vacuum processing chamber escapes the interference with the first arm 201 of the vacuum robot in the vertical direction, the distance between the vacuum processing chamber and the center of the vacuum robot is not limited. In addition, the interior of the intermediate chamber 2 is also minimized so as not to interfere in the horizontal direction and the vertical direction according to the necessary minimum movement of the load lock stage 72, the sample mounting table 102, the wand 201 and the arms 202 and 203 of the vacuum robot 200, respectively. The intermediate space 2
The volume of the vacuum evacuation space inside is minimized. As a result, the first arm 201 and the second arm 202 of the vacuum robot have a length of about 40
% Can be shortened. Further, by arranging in this manner, the intermediate chamber 2 can be made to have a size that does not cause any inconvenience in cutting and using a single member. Vacuum processing chamber 1
In the case where the sample mounting table 102 is arranged in correspondence with the position “00” and the sample is to be delivered, the sample mounting table 102 is in the intermediate chamber 2 and the sample W is set by the wand 201 of the vacuum robot.
Is extended on the sample mounting table 102, and is configured to receive a sample by a sample lifting pin (not shown) provided on the sample mounting table.

The vacuum robot 200 is formed with a wand 201, a first arm 202, a second arm 203 and a link mechanism, and is engaged with a driving unit 205. The vacuum robot 200 is moved into the intermediate chamber 2 by the flange 204,
Being pivoted. To maintain the vacuum, an O-ring or the like is naturally used, but in this description, the description of the O-ring and the like is omitted in other portions.

The processing performed in the vacuum processing chamber 100 includes, for example,
The present invention can be applied to any processing such as plasma etching, film formation processing, and heat treatment. Incidentally, reference numeral 101 denotes a duct for evacuating the vacuum. The vacuum chamber other than the intermediate chamber 2 and the load lock chamber 70 also has the function of evacuating, but is not shown.

FIG. 3 shows a state in which the sample W is received by the sample mounting table 102, and the sample mounting table 102 is raised and the gate flange 10 is lifted.
A state in which the vacuum processing chamber 100 and the space in the intermediate chamber 2 are shielded and vacuum processing is performed in a portion 2a is shown. The vacuum robot is in the retracted position by folding the first and second arms.
In this state, in the load lock chamber 70, the sample is received in the vacuum chamber by a series of operations shown in FIGS. 4 to 7, or is discharged by the reverse operation.

In FIG. 4, the gate 71 is opened, the sample is brought into the load lock chamber by the atmospheric robot 60, and the sample is placed on the load lock stage 72. I do. Thereafter, as shown in FIG. 5, the load lock gate 71 is closed, the load lock chamber 70 is evacuated, and the pressure is reduced until the equilibrium state with the vacuum in the intermediate chamber can be maintained. After the pressure in the load lock chamber reaches a predetermined pressure, the load lock stage 72 descends to make the load lock chamber communicate with the intermediate chamber space, and the vacuum robot 200
Is sent between the sample and the stage, the stage is further lowered (FIG. 7), and the sample is transferred onto the wand.
Retract the wand and move on to the next step. When dispensing the processed sample, the sample is dispensed by going back to FIG. 7 from FIG.

Next, the method of forming the intermediate chamber 2 is as follows. If the sample is a semiconductor wafer, any commonly used aluminum alloy can be procured in the range of commercially available rolled materials. As the substrate becomes large, the arm of the vacuum robot itself becomes large, and the thickness (vertical dimension) of the arm becomes large. Therefore, the thickness dimension of the intermediate chamber cannot be covered by a commercially available rolled material. It is possible that it will not be possible. FIG. 8 illustrates a method of assembling a single component using commercially available materials at such times. The intermediate chamber members 2a, 2b, and 2c are arranged as shown in FIG. 8, and the contact portions thereof are friction-welded FW by tracing with a high-speed drill.
And integrated. The method of friction welding is not limited to FIG.

As described above, the load lock stage and the sample mounting table are provided so as to form the lock chamber and the processing chamber above the intermediate chamber space, and the interference between these and the vacuum robot is caused in the vertical and horizontal directions. By avoiding with a minimum gap of
The center-to-center distance between each chamber and the vacuum robot can be made twice or less the size of the sample, and the apparatus can be made compact. In addition, dimensional accuracy is improved by integrally forming the intermediate chamber, and adjustment and control of the vacuum robot are facilitated.

[0026]

Since the present invention is based on the intermediate chamber as described above, the dimensional accuracy between the vacuum chambers is much lower than that of an apparatus in which a plurality of members are connected by, for example, a flange. Is excellent. In addition, the fact that the arm of the vacuum robot can be made smaller has many effects. First, the device components including the intermediate chamber can be miniaturized. This means that the resources used can be minimized.

Second, the space to be evacuated can be reduced, and the power for vacuuming (for example, the power of a vacuum pump) can be reduced. Third, since the size of the vacuum processing chamber can be reduced, the amount of gas used for vacuum processing can be reduced. Fourth, because the robot arm can be downsized,
The GD2 can be reduced, and the power of a motor or the like for driving the vacuum robot can be reduced.

Fifth, since the moving distance of the sample itself can be reduced, even when the sample can be moved at the same speed, processing can be performed quickly, that is, throughput can be increased. As a result of the present invention, when the gate is opened and closed in the vacuum processing chamber, the sample is located above the gate contact portion, and the gate position cannot be seen from the sample. In addition, foreign matter does not scatter directly on the sample. That is, it is also effective as a processing chamber with less contamination of foreign matter.

Further, in the invention shown in FIG. 8, conventionally, a large member is made of a slab material or the like, and the inside is cut out by machining, but a method for minimizing chips is provided. By using welding technology with less distortion, the time required for distortion removal is reduced.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a plan view of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory view of a load lock.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory view of a load lock.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory view of a load lock.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory view of a load lock.

FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram of a method of configuring an intermediate chamber.

[Explanation of symbols]

 REFERENCE SIGNS LIST 100 vacuum processing chamber 2 intermediate chamber 200 vacuum robot 102 sample mounting table 60 atmospheric robot 70 load lock chamber 80 unload lock chamber

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page F term (reference) 4K029 AA06 AA09 AA24 DA01 KA01 KA09 4K030 CA04 CA06 GA12 HA01 KA08 LA15 LA18 5F004 AA16 BB18 BB29 BC01 BC05 BC06 CA05 5F031 CA02 CA05 DA17 FA01 FA11 FA12 GA43 GA47 MA04 MA09 MA28

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A cassette station for accommodating a substrate to be processed, a load lock chamber and an unload lock chamber, an intermediate chamber, a plurality of vacuum processing chambers, and a work carried between the cassette station and the load lock chamber. In a vacuum processing apparatus having an atmospheric robot that operates in the atmosphere and a vacuum robot that operates in a vacuum, the intermediate chamber forms at least a part of a vacuum chamber including a vacuum load lock chamber, and a substrate mount of the opposing vacuum processing chamber. A vacuum processing apparatus having a structure in which a distance between a center of the installation position and a position at which the center of rotation of the vacuum robot is arranged is set to be equal to or less than twice the size of a substrate to be processed. 2. The vacuum processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein at least one member constituting the intermediate chamber has a substantially plate shape, and is formed of the same member or a member joined to the same member. A vacuum processing apparatus characterized in that the arrangement is determined by the position of the member processed. 3. The vacuum processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the member forming the intermediate chamber or the vacuum chamber is formed by integrally joining a plurality of members by friction welding.