CN110741468A - Method and apparatus for use in substrate processing - Google Patents

Method and apparatus for use in substrate processing Download PDF

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Publication number
CN110741468A
CN110741468A CN201780091485.1A CN201780091485A CN110741468A CN 110741468 A CN110741468 A CN 110741468A CN 201780091485 A CN201780091485 A CN 201780091485A CN 110741468 A CN110741468 A CN 110741468A
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Prior art keywords
substrate
substrates
rate
processing
stack arrangement
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CN201780091485.1A
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Chinese (zh)
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阿尔贝托·艾米利奥·拉福
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Applied Materials Italia SRL
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Applied Materials Baccini SpA
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    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01L—SEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES NOT COVERED BY CLASS H10
    • H01L21/00—Processes or apparatus adapted for the manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or solid state devices or of parts thereof
    • H01L21/67—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere
    • H01L21/677—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations
    • H01L21/67763—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations the wafers being stored in a carrier, involving loading and unloading
    • H01L21/67778—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations the wafers being stored in a carrier, involving loading and unloading involving loading and unloading of wafers
    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01L—SEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES NOT COVERED BY CLASS H10
    • H01L21/00—Processes or apparatus adapted for the manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or solid state devices or of parts thereof
    • H01L21/67—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere
    • H01L21/677—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations
    • H01L21/67763—Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations the wafers being stored in a carrier, involving loading and unloading
    • H01L21/67769—Storage means

Abstract

According to aspects of the present disclosure, methods for processing substrates are provided, the method including providing a substrate loading stack arrangement including a plurality of substrates, unloading the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a th rate, and filling a substrate buffer with th portions of the plurality of substrates with substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a second rate, wherein the second rate is less than a th rate, furthermore, an apparatus for processing substrates is provided, the apparatus including a receiving portion for arranging the substrate loading stack arrangement, at least transport devices for transporting the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement to the substrate buffer, and a controller configured for controlling the substrate loading stack arrangement to unload the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at the th rate, and for controlling the substrate buffer to load th portions of the plurality of substrates into the substrate buffer at the second rate, wherein the second rate is less than an th rate.

Description

Method and apparatus for use in substrate processing
Technical Field
Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to methods and apparatus for use in substrate processing. Embodiments of the present disclosure relate specifically to methods and apparatus that allow continuous operation of substrate processing. Even more particularly, embodiments of the present disclosure allow for replacement of substrate loading stack arrangements without interrupting substrate processing. Embodiments of the present disclosure relate specifically to processing solar cell substrates.
Background
Solar cells are Photovoltaic (PV) devices that convert sunlight directly into electrical energy, within this field, structures are known that use deposition techniques (e.g., screen printing) to produce solar cells on a substrate, such as a crystalline silicon substrate, to obtain a pattern of electrical conduction lines on the or more surfaces of the solar cells.
Although paying out a loaded substrate loading stack arrangement may be done in a quasi-continuous process, replacing an emptied substrate loading stack arrangement results in interrupting the substrate loading to step processing methods that have been proposed so far for replacing the emptied loading stack arrangement with a new, fully filled loading stack arrangement particularly quickly have proven unsatisfactory.
In view of the above, new methods and apparatus for continuously loading substrates into a manufacturing process would be beneficial to overcome at least problems in the art.
Disclosure of Invention
In view of the above, a method for processing a substrate according to the independent method claim and an apparatus for processing a substrate according to the independent apparatus claim are provided the further details, aspects, optional features and advantages of the present disclosure at the step are apparent from the dependent claims, the detailed description and the figures.
According to aspects of the present disclosure, methods for processing substrates are provided that include the steps of providing a substrate loading stack arrangement including a plurality of substrates, unloading the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a th rate, and filling a substrate buffer with substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement with th portions of the plurality of substrates at a second rate.
In accordance with a further aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided an apparatus for processing substrates, the apparatus comprising a receiving portion for arranging a substrate loading stack arrangement, at least transport devices for transporting a plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement to a substrate buffer, and a controller configured to control the substrate loading stack arrangement to unload the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a rate, and to control the substrate buffer to load a th portion of the plurality of substrates into the substrate buffer at a second rate, wherein the second rate is less than the th rate.
According to another aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a method for processing substrates, the method comprising the steps of providing a substrate loading stack arrangement comprising a plurality of substrates, unloading the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a 0 th rate, and filling a substrate buffer with substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement with a 1 th portion of the plurality of substrates at a second rate, wherein the second rate is less than the th rate, and according to the method, the second rate is a half (i.e., 1/2) of the th rate, alternatively or additionally, the th portion of the plurality of substrates is an half of the plurality of substrates , unloading the th portion of the substrates from the substrate buffer at the th rate upon the substrate loading stack arrangement being empty.
According to another aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided apparatus for processing substrates, the apparatus comprising a receiving portion for arranging a substrate loading stack arrangement, at least 0 transport devices for transporting a plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement to a substrate buffer, and a controller configured for controlling the substrate loading stack arrangement to unload the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a rate 1, and for controlling the substrate buffer to load a 2 th 2 portion of the plurality of substrates into the substrate buffer at a second rate, wherein the second rate is less than the th rate, and further according to the method, the second rate is half of the rate (i.e., 1/2), alternatively or additionally, the th portion of the plurality of substrates is half of the plurality of substrates the controller is configured to denier the substrate loading stack arrangement is empty, the th portion of substrates is unloaded from the substrate buffer at the rate .
All method acts as described herein may generally be controlled by a controller as described herein. A controller as described herein may be configured to perform method acts as described herein.
Embodiments are also directed to apparatuses for performing the disclosed methods and including apparatus portions for performing each of the described method aspects. These method aspects may be performed by hardware components, a computer programmed by appropriate software, by any combination of the two, or in any other manner. Furthermore, embodiments according to the present disclosure also relate to a method for operating the described apparatus. The method for operating the described apparatus comprises method aspects for performing each function of the apparatus.
Drawings
So that the manner in which the above recited features of the present disclosure are attained and can be understood in detail, a more particular description of the disclosure, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to the embodiments thereof which are illustrated in the appended drawings. The drawings relate to embodiments of the disclosure and are described below:
fig. 1-6 show schematic views of an apparatus for processing a substrate according to embodiments described herein;
fig. 7 shows a schematic view of an exemplary transport device according to embodiments described herein, according to which the transport device is a printing nest; and is
Fig. 8 shows a schematic view of a method for processing a substrate according to embodiments described herein.
Detailed Description
In addition, features illustrated or described as part of embodiments can be used on or in conjunction with other embodiments to yield yet a further embodiments.
An apparatus for processing substrates may also be referred to herein as a "processing line". , and is not limited to the embodiment of fig. 1, the apparatus may include or more transport devices 3, 4 and 5, such as transport devices, or more specifically conveyor belts.
The or more processing stations as described herein may be selected from the group consisting of a substrate unloading station, a printing station, an alignment station, a buffer station, an inspection station, a heating station, a scoring station, a cutting station, a cleaving station, a gluing station, a boxing station, and any combination thereof.
In some embodiments the apparatus is configured for substrate processing such as screen printing, ink jet printing, laser processing (e.g., laser scribing), flexo printing, gravure printing, stamp imaging (stamp printing), laser transfer printing, and the like, hi particular, the apparatus may be configured for substrate processing using techniques capable of transferring a pattern into or onto a substrate, for example, the apparatus may be configured for printing, such as screen printing, in some embodiments the processing station may include or more print heads and or more screen devices (scriend) for screen printing of patterns, such as fingers and/or bus bars on a substrate for producing solar cells, in some embodiments the screen devices define patterns or features corresponding to structures to be printed on the substrate, where the patterns or features may include at least of holes, slots, cuts, grooves of scribes, or other gaps (aperturers).
The present embodiments are particularly useful for use in the manufacturing process of shingled solar cells in embodiments where a substrate loading stack arrangement is loaded with a substantially square substrate, for example for single crystal solar cells, the substantially square substrate may have cuts at four corners of the substrate, subsequent processing stations may include or more processing stations that scribe and/or cleave the substrate and or more processing stations that distribute the substrate into several substrate strings (strings), such as 4 to 6 substrate strings, which are then typically glued at to form shingled solar cell substrates.
The substrate loading stack arrangement and the substrate buffer are typically provided with so-called substrate trays, herein abbreviated as "trays", each tray being adapted to receive substrates the number of trays of the substrate loading stack arrangement may be in the range of more than 50 or even more than 100 the number of trays in the substrate buffer typically corresponds to half the number of trays in the substrate loading stack arrangement.
The apparatus as described herein may include a substrate unloading station for unloading substrates from the processing line, the substrate unloading station generally disposed after the substrates have been partially or fully processed, the substrates may be unloaded into a substrate unloading stacking arrangement in embodiments, the substrate unloading stacking arrangement is the same as the substrate loading stacking arrangement as described herein, the substrate unloading stacking arrangement may be positioned after the substrates have been subjected to or more processing actions in or more processing stations.
As described herein, additional substrate buffers may be provided at the unload position of the apparatus for processing substrates (i.e., the position of the apparatus where or all of the processing has occurred). the substrate buffer at the unload position is typically operated such that when the substrate unload stack arrangement is replaced with a new substrate unload stack arrangement, the substrate buffer is filled with substrates. once the new substrate unload stack arrangement is installed, substrates from the buffer are unloaded and directed toward the new substrate unload stack arrangement.
Returning to the exemplary illustration of fig. 1, the embodiment shows a process line including conveyors 3, 4 and 5, substrate buffer 2 and processing station 6. furthermore, a receiving portion for a substrate unloading stack arrangement is schematically illustrated (reception) is denoted by reference numeral 11. the receiving portion should represent the capability of the apparatus to operate in conjunction with a substrate loading stack arrangement, and is not limited to any embodiment.
In the following figures, in case the substrate loading stack arrangement is depicted as being received by the receiving portion, the receiving portion 11 is not shown anymore but is hidden by the substrate loading stack arrangement. The substrate buffer is exemplarily depicted in fig. 1 as empty, i.e. the tray 8 of the substrate buffer in fig. 1 does not accommodate a substrate.
As schematically shown in fig. 2, the substrate loading stack arrangement 1 has been mounted at the beginning of the process line. As shown in fig. 2, the substrate loading stack arrangement 1 is filled with substrates 10. For purposes of illustration, the three lowermost substrates are referred to hereinafter by the numerals 10-1, 10-2 and 10-3. In the embodiments described herein, the trays of the substrate loading stack arrangement are marked with reference numeral 9.
generally, and not limited to the embodiment of fig. 2, a substrate loading stack arrangement may be provided and mounted to the receptacle 11 automatically, e.g., by a robot, or a substrate loading stack arrangement may be provided and mounted to the receptacle 11 manually, the apparatus and/or corresponding substrate loading stack arrangement may be provided with or more quick release fasteners, which is advantageous because it allows for quick replacement of an empty substrate loading stack arrangement with a full substrate loading stack arrangement.
As used herein, the terms "empty substrate loading stack arrangement", "empty substrate buffer" or "empty unloading stack arrangement" especially relate to the case where no or only few substrates are present in the substrate loading stack arrangement, the substrate buffer or the substrate unloading stack device, respectively. For example, for processing reasons, it may be beneficial for processing when replacing the substrate loading stack arrangement that at most 10% or even up to 15% of the substrate trays are still filled with substrates, or that the substrate buffer is filled with substrates again. In the context of the present disclosure, a filling rate of up to 15% or up to 10% is still to be understood as empty.
Similarly, as used herein, the terms "full substrate loading stack arrangement", "full substrate buffer", "full unloading stack arrangement" or similar terms such as "full substrate buffer" relate in particular to the case where all or almost all of the substrate trays are filled with substrates. For example, for processing reasons, it may be beneficial for the process to have only 90% or only 80% of the substrate trays filled, for example, in the substrate loading stack arrangement or substrate buffer. In the context of the present disclosure, these fill rates are still to be understood as "full" or "full loaded".
Fig. 3 schematically and exemplarily shows a situation where processing of substrates has started, after unloading the th substrate 10-1, the substrate loading stack arrangement is controlled to lower trays to allow loading of the second substrate 10-2 on the th transport device, this is schematically illustrated in fig. 3 with arrows shown adjacent to the substrate loading stack arrangement 1, the plurality of substrates 10 are unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement 1 on the th transport device 3, the th substrate 10-1 unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement 1 is depicted as advancing to the second transport device 4, in the illustrations of fig. 1 to 6 described herein, the direction of movement of the substrates is from left to right, thus the th substrate 10-1 will undergo a processing action in the processing station 6.
As exemplarily shown in fig. 3, a second substrate 10-2 unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement and transported by the th transport device 3 has been picked up by the substrate buffer 2, thus, in a possible embodiment of the substrate buffer, after picking up a substrate, the substrate buffer raises the height of trays to allow picking up further substrates.
According to embodiments described herein, in addition to the function of storing substrates of the substrate buffer, the substrate buffer is configured to allow substrates to pass through, according to embodiments, the substrate buffer picks up every substrates while other substrates are allowed to pass through or past the substrate buffer for processing on the process line steps without any intermediate storage, thus, in embodiments, the th rate at which the substrate loading stack arrangement is unloaded is twice the second rate at which the substrate buffer is loaded (i.e., twice the second rate at which the substrate buffer is loaded). furthermore, the th rate for unloading substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement is typically greater than the processing speed of the apparatus as described herein.
For example, if processing stations are th printing devices capable of operating at a maximum speed of wafers per 0.8 seconds, while additional processing stations are capable of operating at a maximum speed of wafers per 0.7 seconds, then the processing speed of the apparatus for processing is wafers per 0.8 seconds.
As used herein, the term "rate" in relation to transporting substrates, in particular in relation to loading or unloading of substrates, refers to the number of substrates per unit time. For example, if unloading of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement is performed at a higher rate than the loading rate of the substrate buffer, it may be understood that the number of substrates taken out of the substrate loading stack arrangement per unit time (e.g. per second) is larger than the number of substrates used to fill the substrate buffer per time (e.g. per second).
As still shown in FIG. 3, a third substrate 10-3 is being unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement, as in the illustrated embodiment, only every buffered in the substrate buffer 2, the substrate 10-3 will be controlled to pass through the substrate buffer 2 directly to the processing station 6.
In the same way, according to the illustrated embodiment, a fourth substrate unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement will be stored in the substrate buffer 2, while a fifth substrate will pass through the substrate buffer to be processed and so on.
In typical embodiments the speed of the th transporter is constant, e.g. not exceeding 400mm/s, the reason for operating below a threshold speed value, such as 400mm/s, is that the speed still allows an acceptable amount of friction between the transporter and the substrate when grabbing or releasing the substrate, but in typical embodiments the processing speed is higher.
The second transportation means may be understood as "speed change transportation means". The second transportation means may for example be operated such that the speed of the second transportation means alternates between a low transportation speed, which may be the same as the speed of the th transportation means, and a high transportation speed, which may be the same as the speed for processing the substrate (e.g. corresponding to the smallest of the maximum speeds of the subsequent processing stations). The low transportation speed of the second transportation means may for example be between 300 and 400mm/s, whereas the high transportation speed of the second transportation means may be between 600 and 800 mm/s.
The speed of the third transport device may be kept constant, for example at a speed corresponding to the processing speed (for example between 600 and 800 mm/s). It is noted that for clarity and adaptability, the language "high transport speed" and "low transport speed" are used, respectively. Likewise, the terms "second transport speed" and "fourth transport speed", respectively, may alternatively be used.
Returning to the drawings, the illustrated combined processing and buffering operation continues until the substrate loading stack arrangement is emptied, which is exemplarily shown in FIG. 4. at that point in time, the substrate loading stack arrangement 1 is typically replaced by a fully filled substrate loading stack arrangement. in order to continue processing substrates during a change of substrate loading stack arrangement, the substrate buffer 2 is emptied and additional substrates to be processed are provided. this is exemplarily shown in FIG. 4 by a schematic arrow adjacent to the substrate buffer 2. FIG. 4 illustrates that once the substrate buffer 2 is fully filled with substrates, the direction of movement of the substrate buffer 2 is changed to unload substrates again.
In conventional apparatuses for processing substrates, the time to replace an empty substrate loading stack arrangement with a full substrate loading stack arrangement is very critical. However, embodiments of the present disclosure allow substrate processing to continue with sufficient time to replace the substrate loading stack arrangement.
Fig. 5 is a schematic view of a case where the substrate buffer 2 is emptied while the substrate loading stack arrangement is replaced, it can be seen from this figure that the process is not interrupted, but the substrate 10 is unloaded from the substrate buffer 2 to be subjected to the process in the lower process stations 6, while the receiving part 11 is currently free of any substrate loading stack arrangement.
As described herein, embodiments may include a controller that may be particularly configured to control or more of the substrate loading stack arrangement, the substrate buffer, or more transport devices, and or more processing stations.
FIG. 6 is a schematic view similar to FIG. 3, however, FIG. 6 also schematically illustrates a controller 20, the controller 20 operatively connected to the substrate loading stack arrangement 1, the substrate buffer 2, or the plurality of transport devices 3, 4 and 5 and the processing stations 6 by connecting lines, it being apparent that there are more than processing stations (not shown) as in many embodiments of the present disclosure, additional processing stations may also be connected to the controller.
According to embodiments described herein, the term "controller connected to the device" is generally understood to mean "controller connected to driver of the device". For example, the term "controller connected to the substrate buffer" may be understood as "controller connected to a driver of the substrate buffer". The substrate buffer may be configured to move up and down to load and unload the substrate onto and from the substrate buffer. This movement may be performed by a driver. The driver may be connected to the controller. The drive may be an electric motor, in particular a linear motor.
Similar considerations may apply to the substrate loading stack arrangement. The term "controller connected to the substrate loading stack arrangement" may be understood as "controller connected to a driver of the substrate loading stack arrangement". The substrate loading stacking arrangement may be configured to move up and down to load and unload substrates onto and from the substrate loading stacking arrangement. This movement may be performed by a driver. The driver may be connected to the controller.
The at least transport devices may be equipped with drives, such as drives for each transport device.
In accordance with an embodiment, the controller is configured to move two or more of the substrate loading stack arrangement, the substrate buffer, the transport device, and the or more processing stations in synchronization.
To allow the substrate loading stacking arrangement to unload substrates from the substrate loading stacking arrangement onto the transport device, and/or to allow the substrate buffer to load or unload substrates onto or from the transport device, the transport device may be constructed of two or more separate belts, and/or may have a smaller width than the substrates to be transported, according to the present disclosure. If two or more separate strips are provided, the strips are typically arranged parallel to each other. The substrate loading stacking arrangement and the substrate buffer may be respectively positioned such that the substrate loading stacking arrangement and the substrate buffer may respectively grab the substrate resting on the conveyor. For example, if the substrate buffer is raised in such a case, the substrate is raised along the tray of the substrate buffer and accommodated in the tray of the substrate buffer. In other locations of the substrate buffer, the substrate may pass through the substrate buffer on the transport device without contacting any portion of the substrate buffer.
According to typical embodiments, the present embodiments are used to manufacture solar cells. The substrate may be square (with or without rounded corners) and may have a maximum dimension of 20cm x 20cm, more typically the substrate may have a dimension of about 15.6cm x 15.6 cm.
The th, second, and/or third transport devices (such as conveyor belts) according to embodiments described herein may include or more sub-atmospheric pressure (underpressure) zones or more underpressure zones at the position of or more processing stations may be particularly useful.
As disclosed herein, a substrate loading stack arrangement is typically full of substrates that should undergo various processing actions in order to fabricate solar cells when mounted on a receiving portion of an apparatus for processing substrates.A plurality of substrates are then removed from the substrate loading stack arrangement by a transport device such as a conveyor.
As described, according to aspects of the present embodiment, only portions of a plurality of substrates in a substrate load stack arrangement may be used for immediate processing while other portions are temporarily stored in a substrate buffer according to embodiments, the portion for immediate processing may be 50% of the plurality of substrates while the portion temporarily stored in the substrate buffer may be 50% of the plurality of substrates.
In other embodiments, other portions are employed, for example, if unloading from the substrate loading stack arrangement can be achieved at substantially higher speeds than the minimum of the maximum speeds of or more processing stations, then the portion of the substrates stored in the substrate buffer can be greater than 50%, e.g., 2/3.
The following is a specific example of an -like embodiment contemplated herein, where the second rate at which the substrate buffer is loaded is different from the processing rate of or more processing stations of the apparatus, furthermore, as is also the case in this particular example, the second rate at which the substrate buffer is loaded may be different from the rate at which the substrate buffer is unloaded when the substrate buffer is full according to embodiments described herein.
According to another example of the present disclosure, the portion of substrates stored in the substrate buffer may be less than 50%, e.g., 1/3 in other words, in this example, only every third substrate is buffered, while two of the three substrates unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement are directed directly to the processing station.
The rate at which the substrate buffer is filled with substrates is referred to herein as a second rate the second rate may be between 0.5 substrates per second and 1.5 substrates per second the second rate is less than the th rate.
According to an embodiment, the second rate is half (i.e., 1/2) of the th rate-this corresponds to a situation where every substrates unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement are picked up by the substrate buffer to temporarily store the substrates more generally, if a 1/n (where 0<1/n <1) portion of the plurality of substrates is buffered in the substrate buffer and 1-1/n of the plurality of substrates is directly processed, this corresponds to a feature that the second rate is 1/n of the th rate.
once the substrate load stack arrangement is empty, the substrate load stack arrangement is typically replaced with a fully loaded substrate load stack arrangement (referred to herein as a "new" substrate load stack arrangement). during the exchange time of the substrate load stack arrangement, processing of the substrates is uninterrupted according to an embodiment. more specifically, substrates from the substrate buffer are unloaded onto the processing line to be processed in or more processing stations during times when no substrates are being supplied.
Embodiments of the present disclosure allow for continuous solar cell production with only positions for solar cell substrate loading using a substrate loading stack arrangement replacement of the substrate loading stack arrangement is no longer an operation critical to overall production time.
In typical embodiments, the number and/or height of trays in the substrate loading stack arrangement is twice the number and/or height of trays in the substrate buffer.
As exemplarily shown in the figures, an apparatus for processing substrates according to embodiments described herein may include more than transport devices.particularly, a transport device (e.g., a transport device) may be positioned at a substrate loading stack arrangement and/or a substrate buffer.A second transport device (e.g., a second transport device) may be disposed directly downstream of the transport device.A third transport device (e.g., a third transport device) may be positioned directly downstream of the second transport device.
In the illustrations of fig. 1-6, the -th transport device is illustrated as a transport device and indicated by reference numeral 3, the second transport device is illustrated as a second transport device and indicated by reference numeral 4, and the third transport device is illustrated as a third transport device and indicated by reference numeral 5 as shown in these figures, the third transport device transports the substrate under the processing station 6. for example, the processing station 6 may be a printing station for printing conductive paths on the substrate, such as printing so-called fingers and/or busbars.
The use of printing couples is of particular interest for or more transport means transporting the substrate under or into the processing station in the example of fig. 1-6, this corresponds to the third transport means 5 according to an embodiment, the substrate is held by the printing couples while the processing takes place, in particular by applying a negative pressure.
In FIG. 7, an example of a print nest is illustrated, the print nest 131 may include a conveyor assembly 139, the conveyor assembly 139 may have a transfer spool 135, a take-up spool 136, a roller 140, and/or an actuator 148, the actuator 148 is generally coupled to the transfer spool 135 and/or the take-up spool 136, a substrate support surface 138 may be provided, the conveyor belt 137 may move on the substrate support surface 138, the substrate generally moves with the conveyor belt to and/or from a processing station.
The substrate may be positioned on the conveyor belt 137 during processing actions in the processing station 6, such as screen printing actions, the conveyor belt may be a porous material that allows the substrate 10 to be securely held on the support surface 138 (e.g., by applying a negative pressure from below the conveyor belt 137).
In configurations, a drive 148 may be coupled to the transfer reel 135 and/or take-up reel 136 (e.g., via drive wheels 147) such that movement of the substrate 10 on the transfer belt 137 can be accurately controlled within the printing sleeve 131.
In an embodiment, the substrate is transferred from a th transport device (e.g., a th transport device) to a second transport device (e.g., a second transport device) and from the second transport device to a third transport device (e.g., a third transport device). the transport speed of the third transport device may be higher than the transport speed of the th transport device.
As used herein, the phrase "the velocity of the th device is x times the velocity of the second device" or "the velocity of the th device is x times the velocity of the other device" shall describe the case where the velocity or velocity of the th device is higher than the amount corresponding to the product of the velocity or velocity of the second device and x.
Therefore, without being limited to any embodiment, the second transportation device may be used as the speed change device. This should be understood as meaning that the transport speed of the transport means located immediately upstream of the speed changing means differs from the transport speed of the transport means located immediately downstream of the speed changing means. For example, the transport speed of the transport means located directly upstream of the speed changing means may be lower than the transport speed of the transport means located directly downstream of the speed changing means.
For example, the transport speed of the th transporter may be in the range of 150mm/s-500mm/s (e.g., 350mm/s), and/or the transport speed of the third transporter may be in the range of 500mm/s-1,000mm/s (e.g., 700 mm/s).
In an embodiment, the transport speed of the th transporter may be between 33% and 66% (e.g., about 50%) of the transport speed of the third transporter.
FIG. 8 illustrates a method according to embodiments described herein A method for processing substrates includes block 201 providing a substrate loading stack arrangement according to block 201, the substrate loading stack arrangement including a plurality of substrates, in block 202, the substrates are unloaded from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a rate , in block 203, a substrate buffer is filled with substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a second rate, the second rate is less than a rate .
While the foregoing is directed to embodiments of the present disclosure, other and further -step embodiments of the disclosure may be devised without departing from the basic scope thereof, and the scope thereof is determined by the claims that follow.

Claims (15)

  1. A method for processing a substrate (10) of the type , the method comprising:
    -providing a substrate loading stacking arrangement (1), the substrate loading stacking arrangement (1) comprising a plurality of substrates (10);
    -unloading the plurality of substrates (10) from the substrate loading stack arrangement (1) at a rate ;
    -filling a substrate buffer (2) with substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a second rate with an th portion of the plurality of substrates;
    wherein the second rate is less than the th rate.
  2. 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the second rate is half of the th rate and/or the th portion of the plurality of substrates is half of the plurality of substrates.
  3. 3. The method of any preceding claim , further including the step of :
    -unloading the th portion of the substrate from the substrate buffer (2) at the second rate.
  4. 4. The method of claim 3, wherein the unloading of the th portion of the plurality of substrates from the substrate buffer (2) is initiated upon the substrate loading stack arrangement (1) being empty.
  5. 5. The method of any preceding claim , further including the step of :
    -replacing the substrate loading stack arrangement (1) with a new substrate loading stack arrangement (1) filled with substrates.
  6. 6. The method of any preceding claim , wherein
    The th rate is greater than 0.4 substrates per second and/or less than 2.0 substrates per second, and/or
    The second rate is greater than 0.2 substrates per second and/or less than 1.0 substrates per second.
  7. 7. The method of any preceding claim , further including the step of :
    -transporting the plurality of substrates (10) unloaded from the substrate loading stacking arrangement (1) to the substrate buffer (2) using a transport device (3) operating at an transport speed;
    and step preferably includes the steps of:
    -transferring the th portion of the plurality of substrates and/or a second portion of the plurality of substrates from the th transport device (3) to a second transport device (4), the second transport device (4) being operated for accelerating the substrates from a low transport speed to a high transport speed.
  8. 8. The method of claim 7, further comprising the steps of:
    -transferring said th portion of said plurality of substrates and/or said second portion of said plurality of substrates from said second transportation device (4) to a third transportation device (5) operating at a third transportation speed, wherein said third transportation speed is greater than said th transportation speed.
  9. 9. The method of claim 7 or 8, further comprising processing the substrate in or more processing stations, wherein preferably the third transport speed of the third transport device corresponds to a processing speed of the or more processing stations.
  10. 10, an apparatus for processing a substrate (10), the apparatus comprising:
    -a receiving portion (11), the receiving portion (11) being for arranging a substrate loading stacking arrangement (1);
    -at least transport devices (3, 4, 5), the transport devices (3, 4, 5) being for transporting a plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stacking arrangement (1) to a substrate buffer (2);
    -a controller configured for controlling the substrate loading stack arrangement to unload the plurality of substrates from the substrate loading stack arrangement at a th rate, and for controlling the substrate buffer to load a th portion of the plurality of substrates into the substrate buffer at a second rate,
    wherein the second rate is less than the th rate.
  11. 11. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein the second rate is half of the th rate and/or the th portion of the plurality of substrates is half of the plurality of substrates.
  12. 12. The apparatus for processing a substrate (10) as claimed in claim 10 or 11, wherein the at least transport devices comprise or more of:
    -an th transporter (3), such as a th transporter, wherein the controller is configured to control the th transporter at a th transport speed;
    -a second transport device (4), such as a second transport device, wherein the controller is configured for controlling the second transport device in order to accelerate the substrate from a low transport speed to a high transport speed; and
    -a third transport device (5), such as a third conveyor device, wherein the controller is configured for controlling the third transport device at a third transport speed.
  13. 13. The apparatus for processing a substrate (10) according to claim 12, wherein the low transport speed corresponds to the th transport speed and/or the high transport speed corresponds to the third transport speed.
  14. 14. The apparatus for processing a substrate (10) of any of claims 10 to 13, wherein or more of the transport devices are printing jackets (131), the or more of the transport devices being in particular the third transport device.
  15. 15. The apparatus for processing a substrate (10) of any of claims 10 to 14, further steps comprising at least processing stations, wherein the at least processing stations are selected from the group consisting of a substrate unloading station, a printing station, an alignment station, a buffer station, an inspection station, a heating station, a cutting station, a cleaving station, a gluing station, a boxing station, and any combination of the foregoing.
CN201780091485.1A 2017-05-29 2017-05-29 Method and apparatus for use in substrate processing Pending CN110741468A (en)

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KR102528896B1 (en) * 2021-10-21 2023-05-08 주식회사 유성에프에이 Buffer device for board

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