Material or article handling – Device for emptying portable receptacle – Nongravity type
Reexamination Certificate
2000-08-24
2003-09-02
Bratlie, Steven A. (Department: 3652)
Material or article handling
Device for emptying portable receptacle
Nongravity type
C414S404000, C414S938000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06612801
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of arraying substrates, such as semiconductor wafers, a device for arraying the substrates and a processing apparatus of the substrates.
2. Description of the Related Art
For example, in the manufacturing process for semiconductor devices, a cleaning apparatus is used to wash semiconductor wafers (referred to “wafers” hereinafter) as substrates by a designated chemical liquid or a cleaning liquid, such as demineralized water, thereby to remove various contamination adhering to surfaces of the wafers, for example, particles, organic contaminants, metal impurities, etc. Particularly, there is a widely-used cleaning apparatus which dips the wafers in a cleaning bath filled up with the cleaning liquid to clean the wafers.
Japanese Patent No. 2634350 discloses the above-mentioned cleaning apparatus. In the cleaning apparatus, two carriers are loaded and transported to a pickup stage. In each carrier, for example, twenty-six sheets of wafers before cleaning are accommodated. Then, at the pickup stage, it is executed to take twenty-six sheets of wafers out of one carrier collectively. Twenty-six wafers taken out of the carrier in the above way are moved to a wafer-group formation stage to form a group of wafers. Next, it is executed to take twenty-six sheets of wafers out of the other carrier collectively and move the wafers to the upside of twenty-six sheets of wafers standing on the wafer-group formation stage. Subsequently, the wafers taken out of the latter carrier are lowered and successively inserted between the respective wafers taken out of the former carrier, thereby forming a group of fifty-two sheets of wafers (equal to the number of sheets of two carriers). In this way, the resultant group of fifty-two sheets of wafers is transported to a cleaning-and-drying section for cleaning and drying the wafers in batch.
Hereat, before forming the wafer group, the positional adjustment is executed to position twenty-six sheets of wafers taken out of the latter carrier between twenty-six sheets of wafers taken out of the former carrier, respectively. During this insertion, it is noted that twenty-six sheets of wafers taken out of the former carrier do not come in touch with twenty-six sheets of wafers taken out of the latter carrier mutually.
However, the cleaning apparatus disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 2634350 is easy to cause a positional deviation since all the wafers taken out of both carriers are transferred from the pickup stage to the wafer-group formation stage and subjected to the positional adjustment while the wafers are exposed to the outside. Thus, in inserting the wafers of one group between the wafers of the other group, they may be brought into contact with each other for damage. In this way, the conventional cleaning apparatus is unstable in forming the wafer group of fifty-two sheets of wafers. Alternatively, in order to prevent the mutual contact of wafers, the wafer-group formation stage has to be equipped with a feedback mechanism for detecting and correcting the positional deviation in twenty-six wafers taken out of each carrier, thereby causing the apparatus to be complicated with waste of time. Additionally, since it takes a lot of time to move the wafers from the pickup stage to the wafer-group formation stage, the throughput of the apparatus is deteriorated. Due to the provision of the wafer-group formation stage different from the pickup stage, the apparatus is large-sized furthermore.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a substrate arraying method allowing a substrate group (a group of substrates) to be stably formed in a short time and a substrate arraying device suitable for performing the above substrate arraying method. Additionally, it is another object to provide a small-sized processing apparatus for processing the substrates.
The first feature of the invention resides in a substrate arraying method comprising the steps of: taking a first substrate group out of a first container, the first substrate group consisting of a plurality of substrates arranged at regular intervals in the first container; relatively moving the first substrate group upward of a second container having a second substrate group consisting of a plurality of substrates arranged at regular intervals in the second container, thereby positioning the substrates of the first substrate group between the respective substrates of the second group in plan view; inserting the respective substrates of the second substrate group between the respective substrates of the first substrate group arranged above the second container while raising the substrates of the second group from the inside of the second container, thereby forming a third substrate group consisting of the substrates in number of two containers, the substrates of the third substrate group being arranged at regular intervals being substantial half of the regular intervals of the substrates of the first and second substrate groups.
According to the invention, for example, it is executed on a stage to take a plurality of substrates out of one container. Subsequently, on the same stage, it is executed to take a plurality of substrates out of the other container and insert the plural substrates taken out of the latter container between the plural substrates taken out of the former container, respectively, thereby forming a group of substrates in number of two containers where the resultant substrates are arranged at substantial half of the regular intervals. In this way, owing to the formation of the group of substrates on the identical stage at the time of taking the plural substrates out of the other container, the same formation can be accomplished in a short time, stably. Moreover, as there is no need to prepare an additional stage or space to form the group of substrates, it is possible to miniaturize a processing apparatus for processing the group of substrates.
Again in the present invention, it is also executed to move the plural substrates taken out of the former container to the upside of the latter container relatively, thereby respectively positioning the substrates taken out of the former container between the substrates in the latter container in plan view. Especially, if moving the substrates right above the latter container, it is possible to just insert each one of the plural substrates being taken out of the latter container and also guided by grooves between adjoining ones of the substrates taken out of the former container. Then, with the prevention of contact between the respective substrates taken out of the former container and those taken out of the latter container, it is possible to accomplish the formation of the group of substrates stably. Further, since respective positions of the plural substrates are fixed in the latter container, it is possible to carry out the positioning of the respective substrates taken out of the former container, with ease. Accordingly, the present invention can dispense with a complicated mechanism for detecting and correcting positional differences of the respective substrates.
The second feature of the invention resides in a substrate arraying method further comprising the step of: reversing the respective substrates of the first substrate group, wherein the reversing step is carried out between the step of taking the first substrate group out of the first container and the step of inserting the respective substrates of the second substrate group between the respective substrates of the first substrate group arranged above the second container thereby to form the third substrate group consisting of the substrates in number of two containers, the substrates of the third substrate group being arranged at regular intervals being substantial half of the regular intervals of the substrates of the first and second substrate groups.
According to the above method, after reversing the respective substrates taken out of th
Bratlie Steven A.
Morrison & Foerster / LLP
Tokyo Electron Limited
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