Stackable chamber apparatus

Details Stackable chamber apparatus Stackable chamber apparatus

2000-01-27

2001-04-24

Mills, Gregory (Department: 1763)

Adhesive bonding and miscellaneous chemical manufacture

Differential fluid etching apparatus

With microwave gas energizing means

C134S084000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06221204

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a processing chamber apparatus, and in particular, to a processing chamber system having a plurality of processing chamber units which can be stacked with each other.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In a manufacturing process of a semiconductor device or a liquid crystal display (LCD) including wet etching, cleaning, wet spin etching, coating, and developing, various kinds of acid tanks or chambers are utilized.
Conventionally, an acid tank used for wet etching, cleaning, coating, and developing is of an open type. An evacuating equipment is often used for evacuating the vaporized gas or acidic gas of the solvent utilized in the manufacturing process. However, the evacuating capacity cannot fulfill the need for protecting the workers. When the solvent or acidic gas has dispersed into the clean room, the health of the workers can be affected. Generally, the acid tank is used to process a batch of substrates, for example, the semiconductor wafers or the glass substrates of the LCDs. The parameters of the manufacturing process cannot be precisely controlled and wafer-to-wafer differences can be found. There are several kinds of processing chambers mostly for processing a single substrate, for example, a semiconductor wafer or an LCD glass substrate. The parameters of the manufacturing process can be precisely controlled and the wafer-to-wafer differences can be reduced. However, the production cost is adversely increased.
Referring to
FIG. 1A
, a processing chamber used for processing a substrate
105
includes a housing
101
, a motor
102
mounted within the housing
101
, a chuck
103
driven by the motor
102
for holding and rotating the substrate
105
, and a nozzle
104
for dispensing the processing material
106
onto the substrate
105
.
When the processing material
106
is dispensed onto the rotating substrate
105
, the processing material
106
is uniformly distributed on the surface of the substrate
105
due to the centrifugal force.
The processing material
106
on the substrate
105
is continuously thrown out. The farther the distance from the center of the substrate
105
is, the greater the relative speed of the processing material
106
with respect to the air is.
In the case that the processing material
106
is a volatile material, the farther the distance from the center of the substrate
105
is, the more the vapor or gas of the processing material volatilizes in the open-type processing chamber. This causes ununiform concentration of the processing material
106
on the substrate
105
, as shown in FIG.
1
B. The horizontal axis denotes the distance away from the edge of the substrate
105
, i.e., the position of the processing material
106
on the substrate
105
, and the vertical axis denotes the concentration. The maximum concentration of the processing material occurs at the edge of the substrate
105
, and the minimum concentration of the processing material occurs at the center thereof. Thus, the quality of the substrate is not uniform due to the within-wafer difference in a single wafer or LCD glass substrate.
Because the processing chamber apparatus illustrated in
FIG. 1A
is an open-type chamber for processing a substrate, the productivity is limited. Therefore, more processing chamber apparatuses have to be purchased so as to attain to the required productivity. Due to the restriction of the structure, the conventional processing chamber apparatuses cannot be stacked with one another. Therefore, they can be arranged on the ground of the clean room, and this increases the production cost.
In addition, under the condition that a plurality of processing chamber apparatuses are used for mass production, the qualities of the products are not uniform, and the repeatability thereof is poor because there are different parameters (the rotation speeds and the acceleration of the motors) between these processing chamber apparatuses.
In the processing chamber apparatus shown in
FIG. 1A
, the motor
102
directly drives the chuck
103
, as shown in FIG.
2
A. Thus, the heat generated by the motor
102
is directly transferred to the chuck
103
. This causes the temperature variation of the substrate
105
mounted on the chuck
103
. The temperature distribution on the substrate
105
is shown in FIG.
2
B. Therefore, the temperature at the center of the substrate
105
is higher than that at the external edge, and this also causes a poor uniformity of the products.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a stackable processing chamber apparatus in order to prevent toxic gas from dispersing to the clean room so that the qualities of the products are uniform. Furthermore, the space of the clean room is effectively utilized so as to lower the production cost.
In accordance with the first aspect of the invention, a stackable processing chamber apparatus includes a processing chamber unit and a driving device for driving said transmitting shaft to rotate. The processing chamber unit includes a body defining a chamber. The processing chamber unit is provided with an evacuating pipeline passing through the processing chamber unit and communicating with the chamber, a draining pipeline passing through the processing chamber unit and communicating with the chamber, a chuck rotatably mounted within the processing chamber unit, a transmitting mechanism for driving the chuck to rotate, and a transmitting shaft passing through the body and driving the transmitting mechanism.
In accordance with the second aspect of the invention, a stackable processing chamber apparatus includes a plurality of processing chamber units and a driving device. The plurality of processing chamber units are stacked in the chamber apparatus. The driving device drives the transmitting shaft to rotate.
Each of the plurality of processing chamber units includes a body defining at least one chamber and is provided with: at least one evacuating pipeline passing through the processing chamber unit and communicating with the at least one chamber; at least one draining pipeline passing through the processing chamber unit and communicating with the at least one chamber; a chuck rotatably mounted within the processing chamber unit; a transmitting mechanism for driving the chuck to rotate; and a transmitting shaft passing through the body and driving the transmitting mechanism.
The evacuating pipeline, the draining pipeline, and the transmitting shaft of one of the processing chamber units are connected to those of another one of the processing chamber units.
The number of the processing chamber units can be increased as desired. A plurality of chucks can be driven by the driving device. Thus, the qualities of the products obtained by processing substrates on different chucks will be substantially uniform. In addition, the heat energy generated by the driving device does not transfer to the substrates and affect the quality of the products.


REFERENCES:
patent: 5344542 (1994-09-01), Maher et al.
patent: 5571325 (1996-11-01), Ueyama et al.
patent: 5674115 (1997-10-01), Yamashita et al.
patent: 5820449 (1998-10-01), Clover

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