JP3718806B2 - Slide slit type heat treatment equipment - Google Patents

Description

[0001]
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a heat treatment apparatus in which a plate-like object to be processed is supported in multiple stages by a support device provided in a heat treatment chamber, and the objects to be processed are taken in and out one by one from the opening of the heat treatment chamber. About.
[0002]
[Prior art]
In a heat treatment chamber, a flat plate workpiece such as an LCD glass substrate is supported in multiple stages and heat treatment is performed while taking in and out one sheet at a time. The robot hand is used to load workpieces in multiple stages at intervals on a loading device called a gondola that can be lifted and lowered, and the gondola is moved up and down to align the position of the heat-treated workpiece with the position of the opening. Conventionally, a configuration in which the above operation is sequentially repeated has been used. (For example, refer to Patent Document 1).
[0003]
However, in such a heat treatment apparatus, since the gondola supporting the work in multiple stages is raised and lowered by the number of stages, the height of the heat treatment apparatus becomes high, and due to the height limitation of the clean room where it is installed, the number of workpieces loaded However, there is a problem that the apparatus cost is high due to the low work load rate and the occupation rate of the installation place becomes large.
[0004]
For this reason, openings for loading and unloading workpieces are provided at two locations on the top and bottom, the gondola is moved up and down by half its height, and workpieces are loaded and unloaded simultaneously from the two openings, resulting in high integration and high efficiency. There has been proposed a heat treatment apparatus that achieves the above. (See Patent Document 2).
[0005]
According to this apparatus, the problem of height is improved to some extent, but the problem that the sealing performance in the heat treatment chamber is lowered and the height is increased as much as openings are provided in two places. Further, in recent years, the size of a glass substrate that becomes a workpiece to be heat-treated has become enormous, and for example, a large-sized one that is several times the area of a conventional substrate of 1800 mm × 1500 mm has appeared. For this reason, the dimensions of the gondola and the weight of the gondola when mounting the workpiece become enormous, making it difficult to ensure the three-dimensional positional accuracy for raising and lowering and maintaining the posture, increasing the lifting drive force, and increasing the inertial force. Therefore, there is a problem that it is difficult to obtain the certainty and quickness of the design and operation of the lifting mechanism due to the necessity of slowing the lifting speed.
[0006]
On the other hand, as a heat treatment apparatus of a type that holds the workpiece loading apparatus in a fixed position and does not move up and down, a support base (3) that supports the substrate (P) to be processed in multiple stages is fixedly installed in the furnace (1), The component (5a) of the closing member (5) consisting of five doors is separated from the seal (14) with a hook member (27) or the like and stacked vertically in the opening (4) for taking in and out the workpiece. The five air cylinders (12) are moved up and down, and each interval portion is opened and closed by one component member, and a plurality of workpieces are made to correspond to this one component member. In the case where the workpiece is taken in and out, there has been proposed one in which the opening is opened by one component member. (See Patent Document 3).
[0007]
However, in such an apparatus, when the workpiece is taken in and out, the opening is greatly opened by one component member, and at that time, all the constituent members are separated from the sealed state from the position where the gap is opened. There is a problem in that the temperature distribution becomes worse due to increased hot air leakage in the furnace.
[0008]
In addition, a multistage shelf frame (3) is provided in the furnace body (2), and a shutter door (4) having a rectangular slit (5) on the open surface of the furnace body is attached to be freely movable up and down. A firing furnace has been proposed in which workpieces are put in and out of the shelf frame from the lowest level to the uppermost level (see Patent Document 4).
[0009]
In this device, only a slit is provided in one part of the shutter door, so that compared with the device of the above-mentioned Patent Document 3, there is less leakage of hot air inside, and since the shutter door is only raised and lowered, a small driving force is required. It can be moved easily and quickly. However, since the shutter door is moved up and down by the height of the entire shelf frame, there is a problem that the height of the heat treatment device is increased as in the gondola lift type device. Further, there is a problem that the open slit is always connected to the outside and there is always a hot air leak, and a hot air leak similar to the device of Patent Document 3 occurs when the shutter door moves up and down.
[0010]
[Patent Document 1]
JP-A-6-66715 [Patent Document 2]
JP-A-9-250883 [Patent Document 3]
JP 2000-169169 A (particularly FIGS. 3 to 6 and related explanations)
[Patent Document 4]
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 9-72667 (especially FIGS. 4, 5 etc. and related explanation)
[0011]
[Problems to be solved by the invention]
Accordingly, the present invention solves the above-mentioned problems in the prior art, prevents hot air leakage in the heat treatment chamber without increasing the height of the apparatus, maintains an excellent temperature distribution in the chamber, and opens and closes the workpiece. It is an object of the present invention to provide a heat treatment apparatus in which the driving force of the opening / closing mechanism of the part is small and operates quickly and reliably.
[0012]
[Means for Solving the Problems]
In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention supports a plate-like object to be processed in multiple stages by a support device provided in the heat treatment chamber, and takes out the object to be processed one by one from the opening of the heat treatment chamber. In a heat treatment apparatus for heat treatment,
The support device is provided so as to maintain a fixed position, and the multi-stage is formed of a plurality of sets including a plurality of stages, and is a slit member provided so as to close the opening, A slit member that includes a plurality of corresponding slits that allow the workpiece to be taken in and out and that can be moved up and down, and is provided to face the slit member outside the opening with respect to the slit member. A plurality of small doors corresponding to the plurality of sets, each of which is capable of opening and closing a corresponding slit and is formed so as to surround the opening from the outside when closed, and An elevating mechanism that allows the slit member to be raised and lowered so that each slit can be stopped at the position of each of the plurality of stages, and each of the plurality of small doors can be opened and closed. And having a closing mechanism for.
[0013]
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
1 to 3 show an example of the overall configuration of a heat treatment apparatus commonly called a clean oven as a heat treatment apparatus to which the present invention is applied.
In this example, the heat treatment apparatus 1 includes a support 3 which is a support apparatus provided in the heat treatment chamber 2 and a work W such as a glass substrate which is handled in the manufacturing process of an LCD substrate or a PDP as a plate-like object to be processed in a multistage. In this example, the heat treatment chamber 2 is supported by a step as an opening in the heat treatment chamber 2 so that the heat treatment chamber 2 is opened and removed one by one from the opening surface 1a. It has a door 5, an elevating mechanism 6 and an opening / closing mechanism 7.
[0014]
There are air-conditioning portions on both sides in the width X direction of the heat treatment chamber 2 and in the lower part in the up and down Z direction. In this example, four fans 8 and their motors 81 are arranged in the lower part in the order of the hot air flow direction. An inlet duct portion 9 provided with a guide duct or the like as needed to balance the air volume, a high-performance filter 10 separated into nine units in this example, and hot air flowing parallel to the workpiece W is lowered. An outlet duct portion 11 that is formed as described above and provided with a guide duct or the like, a heater 13 that is disposed in the lower space 12 and that heats the circulating air to, for example, about 250 ° C. to generate hot air, and the like is the same as a normal one Is provided. Reference numerals 14 and 15 denote a heat insulating wall and a door, respectively.
[0015]
The support body 3 is provided so as to maintain a certain position without moving up and down like a gondola, and is composed of 31 end work receivers 32 attached to columns 31 erected on both sides in the X direction, a heat treatment chamber It is comprised by 31 piece x 3 rows of intermediate | middle work receptacles 34 etc. which were attached to the support | pillar 33 standingly installed in the back | inner side of the front-back Y direction.
[0016]
In this example of the workpiece receivers 32 and 34, the multi-stage N composed of 31 stages has a plurality of stages n as the first plurality of stages n ₁ = 5 and n ₂ = n ₁ + 1 = the lowest set as shown in FIG. As a plurality of sets m having 6 stages, m ₁ = 5 sets and m ₂ = 1 set are composed of a total of 6 sets. As a result, N = nm = n ₁ m ₁ + n ₂ m ₂ = 25 + 6 = 31 stages.
[0017]
The reason why the values of n and m are used in this example is that the multistage number N = 31 determined by one actual product specification is used. For example, if N = 30, all of n are n ₁ and 5 and m is 6 of m ₁ alone. If N = 32, n ₁ = 5, n ₂ = 6, m ₁ = 4, m ₂ = 2 and N = n ₁ × m ₁ + n ₂ × m ₂ = 20 + 12 = 32 stages.
[0018]
As described above, the multi-stage is composed of the first plurality of sets including the first plurality of stages (case 1), or, as in the previous example, the first plurality of sets including the first plurality of stages and the second plurality of stages (the second plurality of stages). It is composed of a total of a plurality of sets including a second plurality of sets composed of one plurality of stages + 1) (case 2). The number of the second plural sets in case 1 or case 2 and case 2 is determined in correspondence with N required as an actual product.
[0019]
FIG. 5 shows a schematic configuration of the shielding plate 4 and its lifting mechanism 6, and FIG. 6 shows a schematic structure of the shielding plate 4 and the small door 5 portion.
As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the shielding plate 4 is provided so as to close the opening surface 1 a and includes a slit 41 that allows the workpiece W to be taken in and out. In this example, the slit 41 has four deep groove portions 41a and a hand through which a hand 101 attached to a moving body 100 of a robot (not shown) can pass with a margin so that the workpiece W can be taken in and out by the robot hand. It is formed by an upper gap 41b through which the workpiece W supported by 101 can pass with a margin. The height intervals h ₁ and h ₂ of the deep groove portion 41a and the upper gap 41b are sufficiently small, for example, about 60 mm and 30 mm, respectively.
[0020]
Such a slit 41 consists of a plurality of m corresponding to a plurality of sets m. That is, in this example, as shown in FIG. 4, the multistage N = 31 in which the workpiece W is supported by the workpiece receivers 32 and 34 is n ₁ = 5, and a plurality of sets m ₁ = 5 to the top set to five sets. Are composed of 5 pieces of 41 _{1 to} 41 ₅ corresponding to the step positions and 41 ₆ corresponding to the bottom set m ₂ = 1 set of step positions of n ₂ = n ₁ + 1 = 6.
[0021]
The shielding plate 4 having such a slit 41 is composed of a frame plate 42 and a face plate 43 attached to the frame plate 42 and can be moved up and down. Although not shown in FIG. 5, the slit 41 is formed as a rectangular slit member 41 </ b> A as shown in FIG. 6 and is fitted into the face plate 43. The frame plate 42 is attached to an elevating mechanism 6 (to be described later) via a coupling plate 44 so that the frame plate 42 can be raised and lowered, and as shown in FIG. 7, the moving body 45 is moved so as to move reliably in the elevating direction. And is guided up and down by being coupled to a groove 46 of an auxiliary linear guide facing in the vertical Z direction.
[0022]
8 to 11 show configuration examples of the small door 5 and the opening / closing mechanism 7 thereof.
As shown in FIGS. 1 to 3 and 10, the small door 5 is provided on the outer side of the heat treatment chamber 2 with respect to the shielding plate 4 so as to face the shielding plate 4. In this example, m = 6. As shown in FIG. 4, the small door 5 is formed so that the slits 41 _{1 to} 41 ₆ corresponding to the respective 5 _{1 to} 5 ₆ can be opened and closed in order from the top. Therefore, in this example, the packing 51 (only the center position is shown with the dashed-dotted line C in FIG. 9) is attached to the step part around the small door 5, and these are the main-body structure parts 1b of a clean oven. And both ends are provided in contact with the abutting member 1c attached thereto.
[0023]
In such a small door 5, the mounting plate 52 is attached to the arm 78 of the opening / closing mechanism 7, which will be described later, by bolts 53 at two places, and one end side of the arm 78 is attached to the rotating shaft 77, whereby the rotating shaft 77 rotates. Then, it is formed so as to open and close the corresponding slit 41 by rotating around this axis.
[0024]
The elevating mechanism 6 can elevate and lower the shielding plate 4 so that a plurality of slits 41 _{1 to} 41 ₆ can be stopped at respective positions of n ₁ = 5 and n ₂ = 6 in this example. To. As described above, as the elevating mechanism 6, various known linear moving devices such as an air cylinder device, a rack and pinion mechanism, a screw mechanism, and a wire suspension mechanism can be used. In this example, a ball screw mechanism is used.
[0025]
As shown in FIG. 5, the lifting mechanism 6 of this example includes a servo motor 61 with a speed reducer, rotation transmission shafts 62 on both sides in the width X direction rotated by this motor, and a ball screw cylinder device 63 to which the rotation of this shaft is transmitted. Although not shown in detail, in this device, the vertical position in the Z direction is regulated and screwed with a ball nut rotated by the rotating electric shaft 62, and the rotation is regulated by the cylinder 63a while being guided in the Z direction. A ball screw shaft 63b to be engaged, a lifting shaft 64 that engages with this shaft and transmits its lifting motion, a bearing 65 that supports the shaft so that it can be lifted in the vertical Z direction, a lifting shaft 64 and the frame plate 42 of the shielding plate 4 The coupling plate 44 is attached to and coupled to each other.
[0026]
As shown in FIG. 3, the opening / closing mechanism 7 has a plurality of small doors 5 _{1 to} 6 _{6 in} this example, so that each of the small doors 5 _{1 to 6 6} can be opened and closed. 7 _{1 to} 7 ₆ are provided. These opening / closing mechanisms 7 _{1 to} 7 ₆ are all the same, and are shown as the opening / closing mechanism 7 in FIGS.
[0027]
The opening / closing mechanism 7 of this example is composed of an air cylinder 71, an L-shaped member 73 provided on the rod 71a thereof so as to be reciprocally movable as indicated by an arrow via a floating joint 72, and is fixed to this and long in the vertical and Z directions. In this example, which is one side member of the linear guide formed on the ridge 74, similarly the rack 75 formed on the back side, the groove member 76 of the linear guide into which the ridge 74 is fitted and guided, the rack 75, The rotating shaft 77 includes a pinion 77a engaged with the rotating shaft 77, the arm 78 having one end fixed to the shaft, and the small door 5 attached thereto.
[0028]
As a small door opening / closing mechanism for opening / closing the slit 41, a mechanism in which the rotating shaft 77 is directly rotated by a motor with a speed reducer, instead of the mechanism using the air cylinder and the rack and pinion as described above, An appropriate structure such as a moving mechanism that combines two one-dimensional operations so that the small door 5 is separated from the slit surface and slid in the Z direction can be used. In addition, as the opening / closing direction in the case of the rotation method, any method of upward opening or downward opening may be selected.
[0029]
The heat treatment apparatus 1 as described above is operated as follows and exhibits its effects.
In the heat treatment chamber 2, the work W is supported in 31 steps on the work receivers 32 and 34 in the state described so far, and all the small doors 5 made of 5 _{1 to} 5 ₆ are provided as shown in FIGS. It is closed. Then, the blower 8 and the heater 13 are operated, and normal air as a circulating gas is circulated so as to pass through the heat treatment chamber 2 via the high performance filter 10 as indicated by an arrow, and the workpiece W is heat treated. At this time, as shown in FIG. 2 and FIG. 4, the shielding plate 4 is placed in a range of (1) to (6) from above a plurality of stages consisting of 5 stages and 6 stages of W _{1 to} W ₅ and W _{1 to} W ₆ , respectively. Six slits 41 _{1 to} 41 ₆ correspond to the positions of the lowermost workpieces W ₅ and W ₆ of the six sets of workpieces W shown.
[0030]
In this state, if a predetermined heat treatment time elapses in order from the bottom of the 31-stage work W, the heat-treated old work and the new work to be heat-treated next are exchanged in this order. become.
[0031]
First, when replacing the pair of workpieces W ₆ , the small door 5 ₆ is opened. Therefore, the air cylinder 71 of the opening / closing mechanism 7 is driven, the L-shaped member 73 is raised, the rack 75 is moved in that direction, the pinion 77a meshing with the rack 75 is rotated, the rotating shaft 77 is rotated, and the arm 78 is moved. The small door 5 ₆ is rotated to open the slit 41 ₆ . In FIG. 2, this state is indicated by a solid line.
[0032]
At this time, the heat treatment chamber 2 and the outside 200 thereof are conducted through the slit 41 ₆ and the indoor hot air leaks to the outside. However, as a whole of the heat treatment chamber 2, the small doors 5 _{1 to} 5 ₅ are kept closed, and therefore the slits 41 _{1 to} 41 ₅ are closed so that no hot air leaks from this portion. The slit 41 has a small opening area formed by the upper gap 41b that allows the workpiece W and the robot hand 101 to pass through and the deep groove portions 41a provided at only four portions in the X direction. Therefore, the hot air leakage stops very slightly. As a result, the atmosphere in the heat treatment chamber 2 is not disturbed, and the temperature distribution can be maintained well. Further, since the shielding plate 4 and the small door 5 form a double heat insulating seal, the heat insulating effect is improved.
[0033]
In this case, in the apparatus of this example to which the present invention is applied, only the corresponding small door 5 is opened in order to open the slit 41, so that the operation can be performed easily and quickly. Accordingly, the heat treatment efficiency of the workpiece can be improved. Further, the driving force for opening and closing can be reduced. On the other hand, in the conventional door opening and closing type heat treatment apparatus provided with small doors, since the interval portions of a plurality of small doors are opened, an operation combining a separation from the opening surface of a large number of small doors and a vertical movement Therefore, the operation is complicated and takes time, and the driving force is also increased. In the apparatus of this example, these points are also greatly improved.
[0034]
When the small door 5 ₆ opens, the robot moving body 100 inserts four robot hands 101 (also shown in FIG. 1) from the slit 41 ₆ under the work W ₆ as shown in FIG. The workpiece W ₆ is picked up and taken out of the heat treatment chamber 2, transferred to a heat-treated work line (not shown), a new work is picked up from the unheat-treated work line, and this is taken from the same slit 41 ₆ onto the workpiece receivers 32 and 34. Put it on. This ▲ 6 ▼ set of exchange of the workpiece W ₆ is completed. In this example, the workpiece is taken in and out only on one surface of the heat treatment chamber 2, but a device may be provided in which the small doors 5 and the like are provided on both sides in the front-rear Y direction and the workpiece is taken in and out from both sides.
[0035]
▲ 6 ▼ pairs when followed by a heat treatment time of the set of the workpiece W ₅ to the workpiece W ₆ is out to work this part elapsed, with open small door 5 _6, the workpiece 1-stage shielding plate 4 That is, the pitch is increased by one pitch, so that the slit 41 ₆ is positioned at the position of the group of workpieces W ₅ . At this time, the motor 61 is rotated a predetermined number of times, the rotation is transmitted to the ball screw device 63 via the rotation transmission shafts 62 on both sides, the ball screw 63b is raised by one pitch by the ball screw mechanism, and the movement is transferred from the lifting shaft 64 to the coupling plate. The light is transmitted to the frame plate 42 of the shielding plate 4 via 44, and the shielding plate 4 is raised by one pitch while being guided in the vertical Z direction by the linear guide 46.
[0036]
This ascending operation is simply, quickly and reliably performed because the motor 61 is only slightly rotated. Further, it is only necessary to raise the shielding plate 4 which can be reduced in weight simply by forming a slit, and it is necessary to raise a heavy loading device on which a large work W is mounted as in the conventional device. Therefore, the motor 61 for raising is set to a sufficiently small output of about 400 watts, for example.
[0037]
As a result, the workpiece W ₅ is taken in and out as in the case of the workpiece W ₆ . Also in this case, since the small door 5 ₁ to 5 ₅ is closed, hot air leakage problem does not occur. At this time, the slits 41 _{1 to} 41 ₅ in the groups ( _{1) to ( 5)} are positioned at the respective works W ₄ .
[0038]
In this way continue to replace the workpiece with the shielding plate 4 is raised by one pitch at a time, ▲ 6 ▼ pairs when replacing the workpiece W ₁ of the top row is 4 up upper end 4a of the shield plate 4 is 6 pitches It becomes the position of 4a 'shown by the two-dot chain line. Therefore, it is necessary to consider the position 4a ′ as the height of the clean oven 1. However, since the height corresponding to the six pitches is about 1/5 as compared with the entire loading height of the workpiece, there is virtually no problem.
[0039]
On the other hand, conventional gondola lifting / lowering devices and devices that raise and lower one slit require an extra height above the loading height of all workpieces, eventually reducing the loading rate of workpieces. It was. Although the lower end 4b is lowered by the amount of the upper end 4a rising, this portion becomes a normal air-conditioning space or a machine space in the heat treatment apparatus, so this portion occupies an extra space and the height of the heat treatment apparatus is increased. It wo n’t be expensive.
[0040]
(6) When the heat treatment of the six sets of workpieces W is completed, (5) the sets of workpieces W are replaced in the order from W ₁ to W ₅ or in the opposite order. In this case, the shielding plate 4 1 pitch or 5 to pitch down opens the small door 5 ₅ closes the small door 5 _6. As a result, (5) the set of slits 41 ₅ becomes a position corresponding to the position of the set of works W ₁ or W ₅ , the small door 5 ₅ is opened, the slit 41 ₅ is opened, and the works W ₁ or W ₅ are opened. Is put in and out.
[0041]
In this way, the workpieces W at all stages are heat-treated and sequentially put in and out, and further such steps are repeated, so that the workpieces W are heat-treated continuously and efficiently. The operation of each device and robot of the normal heat treatment apparatus 1 is automated, and the workpiece W is automatically heat treated.
[0042]
【The invention's effect】
As described above, according to the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, the support device for supporting the flat plate-like object in multiple stages is provided so as to maintain a fixed position. Therefore, a heavy supporting device that supports the object to be processed in multiple stages does not move up and down. As a result, a supporting device lifting mechanism that requires a large driving force and has a complicated and large structure provided in the conventional gondola lifting heat treatment apparatus is not required. Therefore, even a workpiece such as a large glass substrate can be easily and reliably supported.
[0043]
Further, since the support device maintains a fixed position, the accuracy can be maintained as it is when the support device is manufactured with high accuracy. As a result, it is possible to make the slit, which is a passage portion when a plate-shaped workpiece is taken in and out of the heat treatment chamber, with a narrow interval.
[0044]
And since the multi-stage of the support device is composed of a plurality of sets consisting of a plurality of stages, a slit member, a small door, an elevating mechanism for the slit member, and an opening / closing mechanism for the small door are provided in this connection. In this state, the object to be processed can be put in and out of the heat treatment chamber for heat treatment.
[0045]
That is, the slit member is provided so as to close the opening of the heat treatment chamber, and is provided with a plurality of slits corresponding to a plurality of sets to allow the workpieces to be taken in and out, so that it can be raised and lowered, for example, If the position of the slit member is such that the slit is positioned at the lowest stage of each of the plurality of sets in the plurality of sets, the workpiece to be processed corresponding to this from any of the plurality of sets of the lowermost slits. Next, the slit member is raised by one stage, and the object to be processed corresponding to the slit at that time is taken in and out, and thus the slit is raised by one stage and the object to be processed is taken in and out by one stage. It becomes possible. In this case, the elevating mechanism of the slit member allows the slit member to be raised and lowered so that the plurality of slits can be stopped at the positions of the plurality of stages, so that the workpiece can be taken in and out as described above. Can do.
[0046]
Here, since the slit member is provided with a plurality of slits corresponding to a plurality of sets, the workpiece can be taken in and out using the plurality of slits. Therefore, the slit member only needs to be raised and lowered by a plurality of stages constituting each of the plurality of sets, and does not need to be raised or lowered by the total number of stages. As a result, the slit member is moved up and down, but the height of the slit member is reduced to a fraction of the height of the entire stage, and the height of the heat treatment apparatus is greatly reduced compared to the conventional gondola or slit lift type. be able to.
[0047]
When a plurality of slits are provided, the heat treatment chamber and the outside thereof are electrically connected to each other at these portions, but a plurality of small doors corresponding to a plurality of sets so as to face the slit member outside the opening. Since each of the small doors can open and close the corresponding slit and surround the opening from the outside when closed, the leakage of the atmosphere in the heat treatment chamber can be sufficiently reduced. Further, the atmosphere in the heat treatment chamber can be double sealed to improve the heat insulation effect. And the temperature distribution of the atmosphere in the heat treatment chamber can be maintained well.
[0048]
That is, by opening only the small doors corresponding to the slits into and out of the plurality of slits and keeping the small doors corresponding to the other slits closed, the other slits are Even if it is electrically connected to the heat treatment chamber, since the small door surrounds and closes the opening communicating with the outside, it is possible to prevent conduction between the inside and outside through another slit. In this case, since the opening / closing mechanism can open and close each of the plurality of small doors, only the slits that need to be opened and closed as described above can be opened and closed.
[0049]
In the above, since the slit member can be manufactured sufficiently lightly only by forming the slit, the driving force of the lifting mechanism that lifts and lowers the slit member can be reduced and the operation speed can be increased. Further, since the opening / closing mechanism can open and close the small door divided into a plurality, similarly, the driving force for opening / closing can be reduced and the opening / closing speed can be increased. As a result, it is possible to improve the heat treatment efficiency by reducing the time for putting in and out the heat treatment chamber with less power consumption.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing a cross-sectional state of a clean oven as an example of a heat treatment apparatus to which the present invention is applied.
FIG. 2 is an explanatory view showing a side sectional state of the apparatus.
FIG. 3 is an explanatory view showing the front and front cross-sectional states of the clean oven.
FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a combined state of a plurality of stages of the clean oven.
FIGS. 5A and 5B are explanatory views showing a front state of the shielding plate and the lifting mechanism of the clean oven and a part of the slit, respectively.
FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing a schematic structure of a shielding plate and a small door portion of the clean oven.
FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional view showing a part of the shielding plate and the small door part.
FIG. 8 is a perspective view showing a schematic structure of the small door opening and closing mechanism.
FIG. 9 is a front view showing a part of the opening / closing mechanism and the small door.
FIG. 10 is an explanatory view showing a cross-sectional state of a part of the opening / closing mechanism, the small door, and the shielding plate.
FIG. 11 is an explanatory view showing an open / closed state of the small door.
[Explanation of symbols]
1 Heat treatment apparatus 1a Opening surface (opening)
2 Heat treatment chamber 3 Support (support device)
4 Shield plate (slit member)
5, 5 _{1 to} 5 ₆ Small door 6 Lifting mechanism 7, 7 _{1 to} 7 ₆ Opening / closing mechanism
41, 41 _{1 to} 41 ₆ slits N Multi-stage n, n ₁ , n ₂ Multiple stages m, m ₁ , m ₂ Multiple sets, Multiple, Multiple sheets W Workpiece (Workpiece)

Claims (1)

In a heat treatment apparatus in which a plate-like object to be processed is supported in multiple stages by a support device provided in the heat treatment chamber, and the objects to be processed are taken out and processed one by one from the opening of the heat treatment chamber,
The support device is provided so as to maintain a fixed position, and the multi-stage is formed of a plurality of sets including a plurality of stages, and is a slit member provided so as to close the opening, A slit member that includes a plurality of corresponding slits that allow the workpiece to be taken in and out and that can be moved up and down, and is provided to face the slit member outside the opening with respect to the slit member. A plurality of small doors corresponding to the plurality of sets, each of which is capable of opening and closing a corresponding slit and is formed so as to surround the opening from the outside when closed, and An elevating mechanism that allows the slit member to be raised and lowered so that each slit can be stopped at the position of each of the plurality of stages, and each of the plurality of small doors can be opened and closed. Heat treatment apparatus and having a closing mechanism for.

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