JP2015098400A - Crane device for wrapped quartz glass crucible and method for packing wrapped quartz glass crucible using the device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a crane device suitable for handling a wrapped crucible, capable of achieving handling of the wrapped crucible via a machine without depending on manpower.SOLUTION: The crane device is installed in a reciprocating manner on a path between: an upper side of a lifting-up place where a wrapped quartz glass crucible is arranged; and an upper side of a lifting-down place where a container for packing is arranged, and installed in a vertically movable manner relative to the path at each of the lifting-up place and the lifting-down place from the path. The crane device includes four arms extending in an elevating direction. The four arms are arranged at apexes of a quadrangle, and a pair of arms on a diagonal line of the quadrangle are arranged in a mutually retractable manner. Each arm includes a claw extending in an advancing direction of the arm at a distal end of the arm.

Description

  The present invention relates to a quartz glass crucible used for pulling, for example, single crystal silicon, and more particularly to a crane apparatus used for transporting a packaged quartz glass crucible and a packing method using the apparatus.

  In general, a quartz glass crucible (hereinafter, also simply referred to as a crucible) is washed after manufacture, and then packaged and shipped after an inspection process. In recent years, with the increase in purity of semiconductor materials, efforts have been made to minimize contamination of crucibles used directly in the production thereof. For example, when a crucible is used for pulling up single crystal silicon, it is further used after being washed with ultrapure water or the like. Also, from the viewpoint of increasing the production efficiency of single crystal silicon, the size of the crucible tends to increase in diameter, and handling of such a large diameter crucible is difficult, and contamination of the crucible in the inspection and bagging process after manufacturing, In particular, the powder remaining on the outer periphery of the crucible is likely to cause contamination that enters the inner periphery.

  In order to avoid such a problem of contamination, it is effective that the crucible in a clean state after cleaning is mechanically packaged without human intervention, but it is not always easy to package a large crucible. . In particular, it is desired to avoid contamination of the inner periphery of the crucible as much as possible, but if the entire crucible is simply packed, there is a risk that the deposit on the outer periphery of the crucible may enter the inner periphery. The inner periphery cannot be kept clean. Furthermore, there is a concern that the inside of the crucible may be contaminated during the work from opening the entire crucible package to installing it in the lifting device.

  As a technique for solving the above problems, Patent Document 1 discloses that, following cleaning and drying of a crucible, at least an opening of the clean crucible is automatically sealed, and a crucible is inserted into a vinyl bag-like sheet. A crucible automatic cleaning and sealing device has been proposed. By sealing the crucible opening and mechanically packing the crucible with this device, contamination of the inner periphery of the crucible is performed over the period from opening the packaged crucible to installation in the lifting device. Can be avoided.

JP 2001-10611 A

  Here, the crucible packed as described above is usually shipped after being packed in a container (container) such as a cardboard box or a wooden box. This packaging involves handling crucibles packed in bags such as polyethylene bags, that is, handling crucibles that are slippery between the bags, so two or more workers holding crucibles in containers Basically, it was carried in by hand.

  This work has a heavy load on the operator, especially when handling a large crucible, and there has been a demand for improvement. In addition, as described above, it is desirable to avoid the situation in which contamination is caused by manually performing the subsequent packing work, although the cleanliness outside the packaging has increased as a result of automating the packaging of the crucible. Improvements in points were also needed.

  Accordingly, the present invention provides a crane apparatus suitable for handling a packaged crucible and a packaging method for a packaged crucible using this apparatus, which realizes handling of the packaged crucible through a machine without relying on human hands. Objective.

The gist configuration of the present invention is as follows.
(1) It is possible to reciprocate on the path between the lifting place where the packed quartz glass crucible is placed and the lifting place where the packing container is placed, and the lifting place and the lifting position can be moved from the path. A crane device installed so as to be movable up and down with respect to the path in each of the places,
The arm has four arms extending in the ascending / descending direction, the four arms are arranged at the apexes of a quadrangle, and a pair of arms on the diagonal of the quadrangle are provided so as to be able to advance and retreat with each other. A crane apparatus for a packaged quartz glass crucible, having a claw extending in the traveling direction.

(2) Lifting the packed quartz glass crucible with a crane device, moving the crane device to a square columnar packing container, and hanging the quartz glass crucible into the packing container,
The crane device has four arms extending in the lifting direction, the four arms are arranged at the vertices of a rectangle corresponding to the four corners of the packing container, and the arm pairs on the diagonal of the rectangle are arranged. Using a crane device that is provided so as to be able to advance and retract from each other, and provided with a claw that extends in the advancing direction of the arm at the tip of each arm, the four arms are brought into non-contact with the packaging and are packaged with the claw. A packaging method for a packaged quartz glass crucible, wherein the quartz glass crucible is loaded into a packaging container by supporting the bottom surface of the quartz glass crucible to perform the lifting, moving, and hanging down.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to provide a crane apparatus suitable for a packaged crucible that is particularly difficult to handle. Therefore, it is possible to mechanize the packing work of the packaged crucible, which had conventionally been forced to be done manually, by using the crane device, improving work efficiency and enabling packing work in a clean environment. It can also contribute to maintaining the cleanliness outside the package.

It is a top view of the arrangement place of a crane apparatus. It is a side view of the arrangement place of a crane apparatus. It is a perspective view which shows the principal part of a crane apparatus. It is a top view which shows operation | movement of the arm of a crane apparatus and a nail | claw in the container for packing. It is a side view which shows operation | movement of the arm and claw of a crane apparatus.

Below, the crane apparatus of this invention is demonstrated in detail with reference to drawings.
First, as shown in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2, the crane device 1 of the present invention includes a lifting place 3 (for example, a conveyance conveyor end point from a packaging process) 3 where a packaged crucible 2 is arranged, and a packaging container 4. Each of the lifting place 3 and the hanging place 5 is capable of reciprocating on the path 6 between the hanging place (for example, the intermediate point of the conveyer leading to the final packing process) 5 and the above-described hanging place 5. In FIG. 5, the path 6 is installed to be movable up and down.

As shown in FIG. 2, the crane device 1 stretches a rail 61 between struts 60 installed at each of the lifting place 3 and the hanging place 5, and forms a path 6 by the rail 61. A frame 10 is attached so that it can be reciprocated by a moving mechanism 9 on 61.
As shown in FIG. 3, three support plates 12, 13, and 14 that are stacked on the frame 10 at intervals from each other can be moved up and down with respect to the frame 10. It is suspended and fixed to. Between the support plates 12 and 13, link mechanisms 15a to 15d are arranged, and sliders 16a to 16d are provided on the support plate 14, and the link mechanisms 15a to 15d and the sliders 16a to 16d are interposed through the link mechanisms 15a to 15d. Four arms 17a to 17d extending in the up-down direction are attached to the support plate.

  Here, as shown in FIG. 4, the four arms 17a to 17d are arranged at the vertices of the quadrangular prism-like packaging container 4, and the arm pairs 17a and 17c on the diagonal of the quadrilateral and 17b and 17b and It is important that 17d is provided so as to be able to advance and retract from each other via link mechanisms 15a to 15d and sliders 16a to 16d. The link mechanisms 15a to 15d give the above operations to the arms 17a to 17d using the motor M as a drive source. Further, each of the arms 17a to 17d has a claw 18a to 18d extending in the advancing direction of the arm at the tip thereof, and cushion materials 19a to 19d are wound around the outer periphery of the arms 17a to 17d.

As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the crane apparatus 1 configured as described above lifts the packaged crucible 2, moves it to the quadrangular prism-shaped packing container 4, and suspends the crucible 2 in the packing container 4. Used when unloading.
To lift the packaged crucible 2 by the crane apparatus 1, first, the crane apparatus 1 is moved to the lifting place 3, where the support plates 12, 13 and 14 are lowered from the frame 10 via the lifting mechanism 11. At that time, the link mechanism 15a-15d is operated by the motor M, and the arms 17a-17d and the claws 18a-18d are retracted to a position where they do not interfere with the packaged crucible 2. When the claws 18a to 18d at the tips of the arms 17a to 17d are lowered to the placement surface of the packaged crucible 2, the lowering is stopped, and the link mechanisms 15a to 15d are operated by the motor M, as shown in FIG. The arms 17a to 17d are advanced toward the axis of the packaged crucible 2, and the progression of the arms 17a to 17d is stopped when the claws 18a to 18d are brought into contact with the vicinity of the bottom edge of the packaged crucible 2. Here, as shown in FIG. 5, it is important to prevent the arms 17a to 17d from coming into contact with the crucible packaging in order to suppress contamination outside the packaging.

  Next, the support plates 12, 13 and 14 are raised toward the frame 10 via the lifting mechanism 11, and the packaged crucible 2 in a state of being supported from the four sides by the claws 18 a to 18 d of the four arms 17 a to 17 d. ,lift. Then, the crane apparatus 1 is horizontally moved along the path 6 to the hanging place 5 where the packing container 4 is arranged. After the crane apparatus 1 arrives at the suspension place 5, the support plates 12, 13, and 14 are lowered from the frame 10 toward the packaging container 4 via the lifting mechanism 11. At that time, since the arms 17a to 17d are arranged at the vertices of a quadrangle corresponding to the four corners of the packing container 4, the arms 17a to 17d are arranged in the gap between the packaged crucible 2 and the packing container 4 as shown in FIG. The arms 17a to 17d can be stored in the maximum clearance space in a satisfactory manner. Then, by inserting the arms 17a to 17d into this maximum gap space, it becomes possible to increase the movable range of the arms 17a to 17d as shown by arrows in FIG. 4, and the arm 17a shown in FIG. ˜17d and the claws 18a to 18d can be moved back and forth with respect to the packaged crucible 2.

  Accordingly, the arms 17a to 17d are not brought into contact with the package of the packaged crucible 2, and the bottom surface of the packaged crucible 2 is supported by the claws 18a to 18d. Furthermore, since the arms 17a to 17d are accommodated in the four corners of the packing container 4, the side length of the packing container 4 can be brought close to the opening diameter of the housing crucible, and space saving of the packing container 4 can be achieved.

When the packaged crucible 2 is lowered under the above support form, and the bottom surface of the crucible 2 reaches the bottom surface inside the packaging container 4, the descending is stopped, and then the link mechanisms 15a to 15d are operated. As shown, the arms 17 a to 17 d and the claws 18 a to 18 d are retracted from the packaged crucible 2. Thereafter, the support plates 12, 13 and 14 are raised to the frame 10 via the lifting mechanism 11.
On the other hand, the packaging container 4 in which the packaged crucible 2 is housed is transferred to the packing process by, for example, a transport conveyor, where a lid that closes the container opening is attached and packing such as a rope hanging on the container is performed thereafter. And shipped.

  Next, the degree of contamination of the quartz glass crucible when the packaged quartz glass crucible was packed using the crane apparatus for the packaged quartz glass crucible according to the present invention shown in FIG. 1 was investigated. As a comparison, the same investigation was performed when the packaged quartz glass crucible was manually packed by two workers as in the past.

  The degree of contamination of the quartz glass crucible is determined by packing the packaged quartz glass crucible, removing the quartz glass crucible from the package in a clean room, attaching the adhesive tape to the inner surface of the crucible, and then removing the tape. The number of deposits adhered to was visually confirmed, and the total number per unit area was evaluated. The degree of contamination when manually packing the packed quartz glass crucible was indexed as 100, and the degree of contamination when the packed quartz glass crucible was packed by the crane device according to the present invention was calculated as a relative value and evaluated. In addition, it represents that the pollution degree is so low that a numerical value is small. The survey results are shown in Table 1.

  As is apparent from the results in Table 1, the use of the crane device according to the present invention suppressed the contamination of the quartz glass crucible as compared with the conventional manual packaging. In addition, since the quartz glass crucible can be packaged mechanically, labor saving of the packaging has been achieved.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Crane apparatus 2 Packaged crucible 3 Lifting place 4 Packing container 5 Lifting place 6 Path | route 9 Movement mechanism 10 Frame 11 Lifting mechanism 12, 13, 14 Support plate 15a-15d Link mechanism 16a-16d Slider 17a-17d Arm 18a- 18d Claw 19a-19d Cushion material

Claims (2)

A reciprocating motion is possible on the path between the upper part of the lifting place where the packed quartz glass crucible is placed and the upper part of the lifting place where the packing container is placed, and each of the lifting place and the lifting place from the path. In the crane device installed so as to be able to move up and down with respect to the path,
The arm has four arms extending in the ascending / descending direction, and the four arms are arranged at the vertices of a quadrangle, and the diagonal arm pairs of the quadrangle are slid diagonally to each other via a link mechanism and a slider. A crane apparatus for a packaged quartz glass crucible, which is provided so as to be movable so that it can move forward and backward, and each arm has a claw extending in the moving direction of the arm at the tip. Lifting the packed quartz glass crucible with a crane device and moving the crane device to a rectangular column-shaped packing container, in hanging the quartz glass crucible into the packing container,
The crane device has four arms extending in the lifting direction, the four arms are arranged at the vertices of a rectangle corresponding to the four corners of the packing container, and the arm pairs on the diagonal of the rectangle are arranged. Using the crane device, which is provided so as to be movable back and forth so as to be slidable in a diagonal direction via a link mechanism and a slider, and provided with a claw extending in the advancing direction of the arm at the tip of each arm. The arm is brought into non-contact with the packaging and the bottom of the quartz glass crucible that has been packaged is supported by the claws to lift, move, and suspend the quartz glass crucible into the packing container. A packaging method for a packaged quartz glass crucible.