JP2003301254A - Evaporation source device and film forming device provided with the same - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an evaporation source device in which a thin-film forming material can be easily, precisely, and uniformly charged in a short period of time, and a film forming device using the same. <P>SOLUTION: The evaporating source device to be arranged in a vacuum chamber has a crucible 2 comprising a disk-like base part in which an annular groove part 2A is provided and a truncated cone-shaped protrusion (a central part) 2B provided in the center of the base part, a rotary shaft 3 connected to the central part of the crucible 2, a vibrating device 4 mounted on the rotary shaft 3, and a motor 5 connected to the rotary shaft 3. When the thin-film forming material 15 is filled in the groove part 2A of the crucible, the crucible 2 is vibrated by the vibrating device 4 and the thin-film forming material 15 is charged into the top part of the central part 2B. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a film forming apparatus,
In particular, the present invention relates to a film forming apparatus that evaporates a film forming material filled in a container to form a film on the surface of a base material, and an evaporation source apparatus used for the film forming apparatus.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As a conventional film forming apparatus, a thin film forming material is filled in a crucible (hearth) and placed in a vacuum chamber to evaporate this material and deposit it on the surface of a substrate to be film formed. Are configured to form a thin film.

In such a film forming apparatus, in order to stably form a dense thin film having a uniform thickness, it is necessary to uniformly fill the crucible with the material. For example, when filling a crucible with a granular thin-film forming material, conventionally, an operator uniformly puts the thin-film forming material into the crucible, and then smoothes the material using a spatula or the like to form the thin film inside the crucible. Aim to make the distribution of the forming material uniform.

[0004]

If the leveling-out work is performed to make the distribution of the thin film forming material uniform, the work takes time. Further, it is difficult to stabilize the film forming conditions because the uniformity of material distribution varies depending on the skill of each worker.

In particular, when manufacturing a high-precision optical film filter, it is necessary to continuously supply materials because thin films of more than 100 layers are continuously formed. Therefore, a crucible having a large diameter is required. Fill a large amount of material. Therefore, it takes time for the leveling work, and it is difficult to make the material distribution uniform in the crucible, and the uniformity tends to vary.

The present invention has been made in order to solve the above problems, and uses an evaporation source device capable of easily and accurately filling a thin film forming material uniformly in a short time, and the same. An object is to provide a film forming apparatus.

[0007]

An evaporation source device according to the present invention is an evaporation source device used in a film forming apparatus, wherein a container for accommodating the evaporation source therein and a vibrating device for vibrating the container are provided. And (claim 1).

In the evaporation source device having such a configuration, when the container is filled with the evaporation source (film forming material), the container is vibrated by the vibrating device. As a result, it becomes possible to automatically and easily make the distribution of the filled evaporation source uniform in the container, and it is not necessary to manually take time to level the evaporation source as in the conventional case. Therefore, it is possible to shorten the time required for the filling work of the evaporation source.

Further, since the homogenization is automatically achieved by the vibration, there is no difference in the filling state of the material due to the skill of the individual as in the case of the manual leveling work, and the reproducibility is uniform with high accuracy. Can be realized. Therefore, a film forming apparatus including such an evaporation source device can stably form a film.

Further, due to the vibration, the gap between the particles of the evaporation source filled in the container becomes small and the density becomes high, so that the film forming rate is stabilized and the film quality is improved.

A rotation driving device for rotating the container may be further provided (claim 2).

According to this structure, the evaporation source can be heated and evaporated while the container is rotated by the rotation driving device, and continuous film formation can be performed.

A heating source for evaporating the evaporation source is further provided, and the heating source is an energy beam generator, and the energy beam emitted from the heating source is applied to a predetermined spot of the container and the energy beam is applied. The evaporation source of the irradiated portion may be evaporated, and the irradiation portion of the evaporation source may move as the container rotates (claim 3).

According to this structure, the evaporation source of the irradiation section can be heated and evaporated by rotating the container while moving the irradiation section of the energy beam. Therefore, it is possible to continuously form a film.

The container may have an annular groove, and the film forming material may be filled in the groove (claim 4).

According to this structure, the distribution of the evaporation source in the groove can be made uniform.

The container may have a truncated cone shape on the inner peripheral side of the groove (claim 5).

In the evaporation source device having such a structure, when the groove of the container is filled with the evaporation source, the evaporation source is introduced into the upper surface of the truncated cone shape provided on the inner peripheral side of the groove, that is, the top. As described above, in such a configuration, since there is only one inlet for the evaporation source, it is possible to easily and quickly introduce the material.

A leveling device for leveling the evaporation source filled in the container may be further provided (Claim 6).

According to this structure, the leveling device
The distribution of the evaporation source filled in the container can be made more uniform.

The vibration device may be a vibrator (claim 7).

According to this structure, the container can be vibrated by transmitting the vibration of the vibrator to the container. Such a vibrator can be easily attached.

The film forming apparatus according to the present invention is defined in any one of claims 1 to 7.
It is provided with the evaporation source device according to any one of (1) to (8).

According to this structure, in the evaporation source device, the effects described in the first to seventh aspects can be obtained, so that stable film formation can be performed.

[0025]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. (Embodiment 1) FIG. 1 is a sectional view schematically showing the structure of a film forming apparatus according to Embodiment 1 of the present invention. Figure 2
It is the typical top view which looked at the evaporation source device of the film-forming apparatus of FIG. 1 from the top. Further, FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining the operation of the evaporation source device, and shows a cross section taken along line III-III ′ of FIG. 2.

In this embodiment, a gasless ion plating device is exemplified as the film forming device.

As shown in FIG. 1, the gasless ion plating apparatus has an evaporation source apparatus 2 in which a vacuum chamber 1 made of a conductive member is filled with a thin film forming material as an evaporation source.
0 and a heating source 6 for evaporating the thin film forming material of the evaporation source device 20 are provided, and the evaporation source device 2
A conductive base material holder 7 is arranged so as to face 0. At the center of the back surface of the substrate holder 7, a rotary shaft 8 is arranged so as to penetrate the wall of the vacuum chamber 1 and extend to the outside. A portion of the rotary shaft 8 from the chamber wall penetrating portion to the tip is connected to a motor 9 which is a rotation driving device. The motor 9 rotates the rotary shaft 8.

The substrate holder 7 is provided with a DC blocking capacitor Co through a contactor (not shown) and a cable.
And a high frequency power supply (RF) 10 via a matching circuit (MN) 11 and a direct current power supply (DC) 12 via a high frequency blocking choke coil Lo. The high frequency power supply 10, the DC power supply 12 and the vacuum chamber 1 are grounded.

As the heating source 6, an energy beam generator capable of emitting an energy beam such as a laser beam or an electron beam is used. For example, an electron gun that emits an electron beam is used here.

As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the evaporation source device 20 has a crucible 2 in which a thin film forming material 15 is filled.
And a leveling device 13 arranged in direct contact with the thin-film forming material 15 for smoothing the thin-film forming material 15 filled in the crucible 2 and a rotation having an upper end connected to the center of the rear surface of the crucible 2. It has a shaft 3, a motor 5 that is a rotation driving device connected to the lower end of the rotating shaft 3, and a vibrating device 4 attached to the rotating shaft 3.

The crucible 2 is composed of a disk-shaped base portion provided with a groove portion 2A and a truncated cone-shaped convex portion (hereinafter referred to as a central portion) 2B arranged at the center of the base portion,
The diameter D ₁ of the base is, for example, about 30 cm. Crucible 2
Is composed of, for example, copper. Groove 2 provided on the base
A is annular and its cross-sectional shape is rectangular. The thin film forming material 15 is filled in the groove 2A. Width D of groove 2A
₂ is, for example, about 5 cm. Further, the height H of the central portion 2B is not particularly limited as long as it does not hinder the distribution of the evaporated thin film forming material 15 from the evaporation source device 20 in the substrate holder 7.

The leveling device 13 is equipped with a brush as shown in FIG. 4, for example.
Is in direct contact with.

As the vibrating device 4, for example, a vibrator is used. The vibration of the vibrating device 4 is transmitted to the crucible 2 through the rotating shaft 3, and the crucible 2 vibrates in the vertical direction (axial direction) or the horizontal direction. As described later, in order to make the distribution of the thin film forming material 15 uniform in the crucible 2, it is preferable to vibrate the crucible 2 in the vertical direction by the vibrating device 4.

Next, a method of filling the crucible 2 of the evaporation source device 20 with the thin film forming material 15 will be described.

With the door of the vacuum chamber 1 open, the vibrating device 4 is activated to transmit the vibration to the crucible 2 via the rotary shaft 3 to vibrate the crucible 2 in the vertical direction. At this time, the motor 5 may be stopped or may be started. The vibration conditions of the vibration device 4, such as the vibration frequency and the vibration execution time, are appropriately set so that the thin film forming material 15 has a uniform distribution. Then, as shown in FIG. 3, on the upper surface of the central portion 2B of the crucible 2, that is, on the top of the truncated cone,
An operator inputs the granular thin film forming material 15. The thin film forming material 15 put on the upper surface of the central portion 2B is
Rolling down the slope of B, the groove 2A is filled.

Here, since the crucible 2 is vibrating, the thin film forming material 15 filled in the groove portion 2A is made uniform in the width direction and the height direction (thickness direction) of the groove portion 2A. , The gap between the particles becomes smaller and the packing density becomes higher.

Although the crucible 2 is vibrated here, the thin film forming material 15 is put into the central portion 2B.
The crucible 2 may be vibrated after the thin film forming material 15 is charged. Even in this case, the distribution of the thin film forming material 15 can be made uniform.

After the groove portion 2A of the crucible 2 is almost uniformly filled with the thin film forming material 15 as described above, the motor 5 is activated to rotate the rotating shaft 3 and the crucible 2 attached to the tip thereof. Then, an electron beam, which is an energy beam 6a, is emitted from an electron gun, which is a heating source 6, and is irradiated onto a predetermined spot (hereinafter, referred to as a heating point) 6A of the groove 2A to perform heating. Heating point 6 with rotation of crucible 2
Since the region of the thin film forming material 15 which comes to A moves, the filled thin film forming material 15 is uniformly heated by the electron beam 6a, all melts once, and then solidifies.

Here, as described above, the thin film forming material 15 is almost uniformly filled in the groove 2A, and here, the thin film forming material 15 is smoothed by the leveling device 13 before reaching the heating point 6A. Is more uniform, the thickness of the solidified and annularly formed thin film forming material 15 is substantially uniform and the surface is smooth. Further, as described above, in the granular thin film forming material 15 filled in the groove 2A, since the gaps between the particles are small and the density is high, the density of the formed annular thin film forming material 15 is high.

After the crucible 2 is filled with the thin film forming material 15 as described above, the material 15 is evaporated to form a thin film on the substrate. The film forming method will be described below.

At the time of film formation, the base material is attached to the base material holder 7 and the door of the vacuum chamber 1 is closed. Then, the motor 9 is rotated and the motor 5 is rotated. Then, the rotations of the respective motors 9 and 5 are transmitted to the rotary shafts 8 and 3, and the rotary shaft 8 and the base material holder 7 attached to one end thereof rotate, and at the same time, the rotary shaft 3 and the one end thereof are attached. The crucible 2 rotates. On the other hand, the high frequency power source 10
And the DC power supply 12 is operated. Then, the high frequency power and the direct current are supplied to the base material holder 7 via the cable. Thereby, high-frequency power and DC voltage are applied between the substrate holder 7 and the vacuum chamber 1, plasma is formed in the vacuum chamber 1, and a DC electric field is formed from the vacuum chamber 1 toward the substrate holder 7. To be done.

Then, an electron beam (energy beam) 6a is emitted from the electron gun (heating source) 6 and a predetermined spot (heating point) 6A of the annular thin film forming material 15 is irradiated with the electron beam 6a to be heated. The thin film forming material 15 located at the heating point 6A is heated, melted, and evaporated. Then, the evaporated thin film forming material 15 is excited by the plasma generated by the high frequency power, and the excited thin film forming material 15 is accelerated by the DC electric field and collides with and adheres to the surface of the base material. As a result, a thin film is formed on the surface of the base material.

Here, as described above, since the annular thin film forming material 15 has a substantially uniform thickness, the thin film formed on the surface of the base material can have a uniform film thickness. Moreover, since the thin film forming material 15 has a uniform density, it is possible to improve the film quality.

Since the region of the thin film forming material 15 which reaches the heating point 6A moves with the rotation of the crucible 2, film formation is continuously performed. As described above, by filling the groove portion 2A of the crucible 2 having a relatively large diameter with the thin film forming material 15 and continuously forming a film, a dense thin film having a uniform film thickness can be obtained.
It is possible to manufacture a highly accurate optical film filter in which 0 or more layers are laminated.

In the present embodiment, the central portion 2B of the crucible 2 is
It suffices to put the thin film forming material 15 on the top of the crucible 2
Since there is only one inlet for the thin film forming material 15 into the crucible, compared to the conventional case in which the entire crucible is uniformly charged.
Easy to put in. Further, by vibrating the crucible, it is possible to automatically and easily make the distribution of the thin film forming material 15 in the groove 2A uniform, so that the conventional leveling work using a tool is not necessary. . Therefore, the working time can be shortened in the present embodiment. Especially, in this case, since the distribution of the thin film forming material 15 is made uniform by vibrating at the same time as the charging, the working time is further shortened. The effect of shortening the working time is remarkable when a crucible having a large diameter is used.

Further, the thin film forming material 1 is automatically generated by vibration.
In order to make the distribution of No. 5 uniform, there is no difference in the filling state of the material due to the skill of the individual as in the case of manual leveling work, and it is possible to achieve uniformization with high reproducibility and high accuracy. . Therefore, stable film formation can be performed.

As described above, in the present embodiment,
It becomes possible to form a thin film easily and under stable film forming conditions.

In the present embodiment, the case in which the leveling device 13 is provided has been described, but the same effect as described above can be obtained also in a film forming apparatus having no structure. It is preferable to provide a leveling device because the distribution of the thin film forming material can be made more uniform. Moreover, although the case where the heating source 6 is arranged in the vacuum chamber 1 has been described in the present embodiment, the heating source 6 may be arranged outside the vacuum chamber 1. For example, when the heating source 6 is a laser light generator and the device is arranged outside the vacuum chamber 1, a window for guiding the laser light emitted from the laser light generator into the vacuum chamber 1 is provided. It is provided on the wall of the vacuum chamber 1. In addition, here, heating for melting and solidifying the thin film forming material 15 once to form an annular shape and heating for vaporizing the thin film forming material 15 at the time of film formation are performed using the same heating source 6. However, a plurality of heating sources may be provided to perform heating separately. (Embodiment 2) FIG. 5 is a plan view schematically showing the structure of an evaporation source device of a film forming apparatus according to Embodiment 2 of the present invention, and FIG.
FIG. 6 is a schematic cross-sectional view taken along the line VI-VI ′ of FIG. 5. Figure 5
As shown in FIG. 6 and FIG. 6, the evaporation source device of the present embodiment is different from the evaporation source device of the first embodiment except that the structure of the crucible 2 ′ is different from the structure of the crucible 2 of the evaporation source device of the first embodiment. It has the same structure as the source device.

The crucible 2'of this embodiment has a groove 2A '.
The crucible 2 according to the first embodiment does not have a convex portion at the center of the base portion. That is, the crucible 2'has an annular groove 2A 'having a rectangular cross section similar to that of the crucible 2, but the shape of the center 2B' on the inner peripheral side of the groove 2A 'is different from that of the center 2B of the crucible 2. The central portion 2B of the crucible 2 is a truncated cone-shaped convex portion, whereas the central portion 2B 'of the crucible 2'of the present embodiment is a flat circular shape.

When the thin film forming material 15 is put into the crucible 2 ', it is the same as the case of the first embodiment except that the thin film forming material 15 is put into the entire annular groove 2A' by hand. Fill by the method. The thin film forming material 15 put in the groove 2A ′ has a uniform distribution and a small gap between particles due to the vibration of the crucible 2 ′. Therefore, also in the present embodiment, the same effects as the effects described above in the first embodiment can be obtained.

In the first and second embodiments, the case where film formation is performed using one kind of thin film forming material has been described, but layers having different compositions are sequentially laminated using a plurality of kinds of thin film forming materials. The present invention can be applied to the case where the film formation is performed by the above. In this case, for example, a plurality of evaporation source devices according to the first or second embodiment are installed in the vacuum chamber 1.

In the first and second embodiments, the case of so-called single-point heating in which a predetermined spot on the crucibles 2 and 2'is irradiated with an energy beam to perform heating has been described. The present invention can also be applied to the case where the entire crucible is heated at once.

Further, the first embodiment and the second embodiment
In the above description, the crucibles 2 and 2 ′ have the groove portions 2A and 2A ′ and the central portions 2B and 2B ′, and the case where the thin film forming material 15 is filled in the groove portions 2A and 2A ′ has been described. The present invention can also be applied to the case where the material is filled in the recess formed in the base portion including the center without being divided into the center portion and the center portion.

In the first and second embodiments, the case where the present invention is applied to gasless ion plating has been described, but the present invention is applicable to other ion plating such as normal ion plating, sputtering, vacuum deposition and the like. It is also applicable to a film forming apparatus.

[0055]

The present invention is carried out in the form described above, and has the following effects. (1) By vibrating the container when filling the film-forming material into the container, it becomes possible to automatically and easily and reproducibly homogenize the distribution of the material in the container, thereby reducing the working time. The film thickness can be shortened and stable film formation can be performed. Further, due to the vibration, the gaps between the particles of the filled material are reduced to be uniform and have a high density, so that the film formation rate is stable and the film quality can be improved. (2) If a rotation drive device that rotationally drives the container is further provided, the film forming material can be heated and evaporated while rotating the container, and continuous film formation can be performed. (3) A heating source for evaporating the film forming material is further provided, the heating source is an energy beam generator, and the energy beam emitted from the heating source is applied to a predetermined spot of the container and a portion of the portion irradiated with the energy beam. When the film forming material evaporates and the irradiation part of the film forming material moves as the container rotates, the container is rotated to move the irradiation part of the energy beam and the film forming material of the irradiation part is heated and evaporated. Therefore, it is possible to continuously perform film formation. (4) If the container has an annular groove and the film forming material is filled in the groove, the distribution of the film forming material in the groove can be made uniform. (5) If the inner peripheral side of the groove of the container has a truncated cone shape, the film forming material only needs to be placed in one place on the upper surface of the truncated cone shape, so that the material can be introduced easily and in a short time. Becomes (6) If a leveling device for leveling the film forming material filled in the container is further provided, the distribution of the film forming material can be made more uniform. (7) If the vibrating device is a vibrator, it is possible to easily attach the vibrator to the container and transmit the vibration of the vibrator to the container to vibrate the container.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a sectional view schematically showing a structure of a film forming apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a plan view schematically showing a structure of an evaporation source device of the film forming apparatus of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view taken along a cutting line of the evaporation source device of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a view for explaining the structure of the leveling device of FIG.

FIG. 5 is a plan view schematically showing the structure of an evaporation source device of a film forming apparatus according to a second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view taken along a cutting line of the evaporation source device of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 vacuum chamber 2,2 'crucible 2A, 2A 'groove 2B, 2B 'central part 3 rotation axes 4 Vibration device 5 motor 6 heating source 7 Base material holder 8 rotation axes 9 motors 10 high frequency power supply 11 matching circuit 12 DC power supply 13 Break-in device 15 Thin film forming materials 20 evaporation source device

Claims (8)

[Claims] 1. An evaporation source device used in a film forming apparatus, comprising: a container accommodating an evaporation source therein; and a vibrating device for vibrating the container. 2. The evaporation source device according to claim 1, further comprising a rotary drive device that rotationally drives the container. 3. A heating source for evaporating the evaporation source, the heating source being an energy beam generator,
The energy beam emitted from the heating source is applied to a predetermined spot of the container and the evaporation source of the part irradiated with the energy beam is evaporated, and the irradiation part of the evaporation source is changed as the container rotates. The evaporation source device according to claim 2, which moves. 4. The evaporation source device according to claim 1, wherein the container has an annular groove, and the evaporation source is filled in the groove. 5. The evaporation source device according to claim 4, wherein the container has a truncated cone shape on an inner peripheral side of the groove. 6. The evaporation source device according to claim 1, further comprising a leveling device for leveling the evaporation source filled in the container. 7. The evaporation source device according to claim 1, wherein the vibrating device is a vibrator. 8. A film forming apparatus comprising the evaporation source device according to any one of claims 1 to 7.