JP2000349497A - Supply device of substrate - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a supply device of substrate that can cope with the various kinds of substrates and detect two piece taking by a low-cost and compact mechanism. SOLUTION: In a supply device of substrates that picks up a substrate 3 being laminated and placed by a transfer head 2 for supplying to a next process device, the upper surface of the substrate 3 being retained by the transfer head 2 is received by a substrate reception part 8, a measurement end part 18a of a potentiometer 18 of a position detection part 5 is brought into contact with the lower surface of the substrate 3, the substrate 3 is held between the substrate reception part 8 and the position detection part 5 for measuring the thickness of the substrate 3, and two piece taking is judged according to the thickness measurement result, thus inspecting two pieces of the substrate without a tentative placement stage, and plan change such as the adjustment of a sensor position for each kind of substrate.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to a substrate supply apparatus for picking up substrates placed in a stacked state and supplying the substrates to a next process apparatus.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Generally, substrates for mounting electronic components are thin plate-shaped components, and such substrates are stored and stored in a stacked state. When the substrates are supplied to the next step, the substrates in the stacked state are picked up one by one from the uppermost layer by the transfer head. Since the surface of the substrate is smooth, it is easy to adhere to each other. If the substrates are stacked, so-called two-sheet pick-up may be generated in which the upper and lower substrates are picked up in close contact.
In order to prevent such a two-layered substrate from being supplied to the next process, it is checked whether the substrate is picked up at the time of picking up the substrate. Conventional 2
The sheet inspection has been performed by temporarily placing the picked-up substrate on a temporary placement stage and measuring the thickness of the substrate with a measuring tool such as a laser sensor. That is, it was determined from the thickness measurement result whether or not only one placed substrate was correctly picked up.

[0003]

However, the above-mentioned conventional two-sheet inspection has the following problems. First, in order to provide a temporary placement stage on which the picked-up substrate is placed, it is necessary to provide this space between the apparatus and the next process apparatus, which makes it difficult to make the entire apparatus compact. In addition, a measuring tool such as a laser sensor is expensive, and the detection result is not always stable, so that the reliability of the determination of two sheets is low. Furthermore, when measuring various types of substrates, it is necessary to adjust the position of the measuring tool because the measurement position is different for each substrate size. For this reason, there has been a problem that cost reduction and compactness are hindered, and work and time are required for a setup change operation for each substrate.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a substrate supply apparatus which can cope with various types of substrates and can detect two-sheet picking by a low-cost and compact mechanism.

[0005]

A substrate supply apparatus according to the present invention is a substrate supply apparatus for picking up a substrate placed in a stacked state by a transfer head and supplying it to a next process apparatus. The substrate held by the mounting head is brought into contact with a substrate receiving portion for receiving one surface of the substrate held by the transfer head and the other surface of the substrate, and the position of the abutting surface. A thickness measuring unit for measuring the thickness of the substrate by sandwiching the substrate with a position detecting unit for detecting the position of the substrate. And the other is disposed at a position where the transfer head can be moved.

According to the present invention, the thickness of the substrate held by the transfer head is sandwiched by the thickness measuring means disposed at a position where the thickness of the substrate having the smallest dimension among the substrates can be measured. By performing the measurement, the inspection of two substrates can be performed without the need for a temporary placing stage and without adjusting the sensor position for each type of substrate.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a front view of a substrate supply device according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a plan view of the substrate supply device, FIG. 3 is a plan view of a transfer head of the substrate supply device, and FIG. a), (b), FIGS. 5 (a), (b), FIG. 6 (a),
(B) is an explanatory view of the supply operation of the substrate.

First, the structure of a substrate supply device will be described with reference to FIGS. In FIG. 1, a large number of plate-like substrates 3 are stored in a substrate supply unit 1 in a stacked state. A transfer head 2 is provided above the substrate supply unit 1. FIG.
As shown in the figure, the transfer head 2 is attached to the lifting mechanism 2a by the arm 2
b.
A plurality of suction nozzles 6 are mounted on the elevating plate 2c. The elevating mechanism 2a is coupled to a moving table 9 arranged in a horizontal direction, and the moving head 9 drives the moving head 2 to move horizontally.

The transfer head 2 is positioned on the substrate supply unit 1, and then the elevation mechanism 2a is driven to lower the elevation plate 2c onto the substrate 3 mounted on the substrate supply unit 1 in a stacked state. The uppermost substrate 3 is sucked by vacuum suction from the suction nozzle 6 of the mounting head 2. Then, the transfer head 2 is raised and moved by the moving table 9, so that the picked-up substrate 3 is transferred to the plasma processing apparatus 4 which is the next process apparatus.

The plasma processing apparatus 4 has a processing chamber 12 formed between the base 11 and the lid member 10.
An electrode 14 also serving as a substrate mounting portion is mounted on the base portion 11 with an insulating material 13 interposed therebetween. With the substrate 3 to be processed mounted on the electrode 14, vacuum evacuation in the processing chamber 12 is performed. After supplying the gas for plasma generation, plasma processing is performed by applying a high-frequency voltage between the lid member 10 and the electrode 14 by the power supply unit 15. The supply of the substrate 3 to the plasma processing apparatus 4 is performed with the lid member 10 raised. The transfer head 2 holding the substrate 3 is moved to below the cover member 10 and is lowered onto the electrode 14, where the vacuum suction by the suction nozzle 6 is released, thereby mounting the substrate 3 on the electrode 14. .

A cylinder 7 is disposed on the elevating plate 2c of the transfer head 2 with the rod 7a facing downward, and a substrate receiving portion 8 is mounted on the tip of the rod 7a. By driving the cylinder 7 to lower the rod 7a, the substrate receiving portion 8 is lowered to a predetermined height. This predetermined height is a height position corresponding to the upper surface of the substrate 3 in a state where the substrate 3 is sucked by the suction nozzle 6.

A position detecting section 5 is provided on a moving path of the transfer head 2 from the substrate supply section 1 to the plasma processing apparatus 4. The position detecting section 5 has a potentiometer 18 mounted on a distal end of a rod 16a of a cylinder 16 arranged upward through a horizontal mounting plate 17. The potentiometer 18 is connected to a thickness detector 19, and the thickness detector 19 is further connected to a determination unit 20. The thickness detector 19 detects the thickness of the substrate 3 held by the transfer head 2. The determination unit 20 makes a two-sheet determination of whether or not only one of the held substrates 3 is correctly held.

The transfer head 2 holding the substrate 3 is positioned above the position detection unit 5, and the cylinder 1 is positioned in a state where the measurement site of the substrate 3 is positioned above the potentiometer 18.
The rod 6 is projected so that the measuring end 18a of the potentiometer 18 is brought into contact with the lower surface of the substrate 3. By receiving the output signal of the potentiometer 18 at this time by the thickness detecting section 19, the height position of the contact surface is detected. The measuring means used for the position detection unit 5 is the substrate 3
Any device other than a potentiometer may be used as long as the position of the contact surface can be detected by contact with the potentiometer.

When the height position is detected by the potentiometer 18, the upper surface of the substrate 3 is received by the substrate receiving portion 8. When the measuring end 18a is in contact with the lower surface of the substrate 3, the upper surface of the substrate 3 is The upper surface is received by the substrate receiving portion 8 and is at a predetermined height position. Therefore,
The contact surface between the measurement end portion 18a and the substrate 3 detected based on the output signal of the potentiometer 18, that is, the height position of the lower surface of the substrate 3 and the height of the upper surface of the substrate 3 maintained at a predetermined height position The thickness detector 19 detects the thickness of the substrate 3 held by the transfer head 2 from the difference between the two.

In other words, the thickness of the substrate 3 is detected by sandwiching the substrate 3 between the substrate receiving portion 8 and the position detecting portion 5, and the thickness is determined by the combination of the substrate receiving portion 8 and the position detecting portion 5. The measuring means is constituted. Further, by comparing the detected thickness of the substrate 3 with the data of the reference thickness of one substrate of the type by the determination unit 20, it is determined whether the substrate 3 held by the transfer head 2 is one. Alternatively, it can be determined whether there are two or more sheets.

In the present embodiment, the position detecting section 5 is fixedly arranged and the substrate receiving section 8 is incorporated in the transfer head 2 so as to move integrally. However, the positional relationship may be reversed. The position detection unit 5 is incorporated in the transfer head 2,
The substrate receiving section 8 may be provided on the side of the substrate supply section 1. In other words, any configuration may be used as long as one side of the substrate 3 is received by the substrate receiving section 8 and the position detection section 5 is brought into contact with the other side.

Here, the lifting plate 2c of the transfer head 2
With reference to FIG. 3, the position of the substrate receiving portion 8 attached to the device will be described. In FIG. 3, one suction nozzle 6 is mounted on each of the elevating plate 2c at diagonal positions, and the mounting position of the suction nozzle 6 can be adjusted according to the size of the substrate 3 to be picked up. That is, when targeting the substrate 3M of the maximum dimension and targeting the substrate 3m of the minimum dimension, the suction nozzle 6 is mounted at the position indicated by the solid line and the broken line, respectively.

In FIG. 3, the substrate receiving portion 8 is disposed within a range in which the substrate receiving portion 8 can abut on the substrate 3m of the minimum size picked up by the transfer head 2. Therefore, the thickness measuring means is provided at a position where the thickness can be measured regardless of the size of the substrate including the minimum size substrate. That is, even when the substrates to be picked up have different dimensions, there is no need to adjust the position of any of the substrate receiving portion 8 and the position detecting portion 5.

This substrate supply apparatus is configured as described above. Next, the operation will be described with reference to FIGS. 4, 5 and 6. In FIG. 4A, the transfer head 2 is lowered on the substrate 3 mounted on the substrate supply unit 1 in a stacked state,
The uppermost substrate 3 is sucked and picked up. Next, as shown in FIG. 4B, the transfer head 2 is moved so that the transfer head 2 reaches the thickness measurement position, that is, the substrate receiving portion 8 is located immediately above the measurement end portion 18a of the potentiometer 18 of the position detection portion 5. 2 is moved horizontally.

Next, as shown in FIG.
Is driven to lower the substrate receiving portion 8 to a predetermined height position, and at the same time, the rod 16 a of the cylinder 16 is projected so that the measuring end 18 a of the potentiometer 18 is brought into contact with the lower surface of the substrate 3. As a result, the substrate 3 is sandwiched between the substrate receiving portion 8 and the measuring end portion 18a, and the thickness of the substrate 3 is detected by the thickness detecting portion 19 (FIG. 1) from the measurement result of the potentiometer 18 at this time. The determination unit 20 (FIG. 1) determines whether or not two sheets are to be taken based on the thickness measurement result.
Made by

Thereafter, as shown in FIG. 5B, the transfer head 2 returns to the substrate supply section 1 again, where the time of the plasma processing performed in the processing chamber 12 of the plasma processing apparatus 4 is increased. Wait until. When the plasma processing of the preceding substrate 3 is completed, the lid member 10 is raised as shown in FIG. 6A, and the substrate 3 is transferred to the transfer head 2 for unloading.
2 carried out. Thereafter, the transfer head 2 that has been on standby moves below the lid member 10 of the plasma processing apparatus 4, and mounts the held substrate 3 on the electrode 14. Then, it returns to the substrate supply unit 1 again and waits.

The result 2 of the thickness measurement shown in FIG.
If it is determined that the substrate is to be picked up, the operator may take action to remove one of the substrates 3 held by the transfer head 2, or place the held substrate 3 on the substrate supply unit 1 once. An appropriate processing method, such as performing a return operation, can be selected.

As described above, during the transfer of the substrate 3 picked up from the stacked state, the two-board inspection is performed while the substrate 3 is held by the transfer head 2, so that the conventionally required two-board pick-up is performed. Since a temporary stage for inspection is not required, the apparatus can be made compact. In addition, since the thickness measuring means is arranged in the transfer head 2 at a position where the thickness of the substrate of the smallest dimension can be measured, even if a variety of substrates are to be processed, two sheets can be prepared without changing the setup. Take inspection.

[0024]

According to the present invention, the substrate held by the transfer head is sandwiched by the thickness measuring means disposed at a position where the thickness of the smallest substrate among the substrates can be measured. Since the thickness is measured, two-substrate inspection of the substrate can be performed without the need for a temporary placement stage and without the necessity of changing the setup such as adjusting the sensor position for each substrate type.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view of a substrate supply apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a plan view of a substrate supply apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a plan view of a transfer head of the substrate supply device according to the embodiment of the present invention;

4A is a diagram illustrating a substrate supply operation according to one embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 4B is a diagram illustrating a substrate supply operation according to one embodiment of the present invention;

5A is a diagram illustrating a substrate supply operation according to one embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 5B is a diagram illustrating a substrate supply operation according to one embodiment of the present invention;

6A is a diagram illustrating a substrate supply operation according to an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 6B is a diagram illustrating a substrate supply operation according to an embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Substrate supply part 2 Transfer head 3 Substrate 5 Position detection part 8 Substrate receiving part 19 Thickness detection part 20 Judgment part

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A substrate supply device for picking up a substrate placed in a stacked state by a transfer head and supplying the substrate to a next process apparatus, wherein the substrate held by the transfer head is transferred to the transfer head. By holding the substrate held by the mounting head between a substrate receiving portion that receives one surface of the substrate and a position detection portion that contacts the other surface of the substrate and detects the position of the contact surface, the substrate is sandwiched. Equipped with a thickness measuring means for measuring the thickness,
Either the substrate receiving portion or the position detecting portion is attached to the transfer head, and the substrate is disposed at a position where the thickness of the substrate of the smallest dimension held by the transfer head can be measured, and the other is transferred to the transfer head. A substrate supply device disposed at a position where a mounting head can move.