JPH0252425A - Treatment apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enhance the operation efficiency by a method wherein an illumination lamp is installed in an isolation space part in a loading area where an object to be treated is passed in order to easily remove a broken fragment of the object to be treated. CONSTITUTION:A loading area 6 whose circumference has been surrounded by an aluminum sheet is constituted to be bright. That is to say, an illumination lamp, e.g., a fluorescent lamp 14, is installed on the side, e.g., on the right side, of a carrying-in port 12 in such a way that both ends of a vertical motion mechanism 5 in the loading area 6 are in parallel with faces formed in a vertical direction. This fluorescent lamp 14 is formed in such a way that a lighting-up circuit by opening a door 13a of a maintenance opening and shutting port 13 and a lighting-up circuit to be switched on manually from an OR circuit. Accordingly, a visual observation can be executed easily; a loading state can be grasped by this visual observation; when a defective state is recognized, a loading drive can comply instantaneously. In addition, when a delivery of a conveyance operation has been finished to be imperfect and a boat 4 loading a wafer 3 is dropped to the rear surface of an isolated region and is broken, it is possible to easily remove this broken fragment.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] [Purpose of the invention] (Industrial application field) The present invention relates to a processing device.

(Prior art) Generally, in the semiconductor manufacturing process, semiconductor wafers (hereinafter referred to as
Heat treatment furnaces are used to form various thin films such as insulating films, compound semiconductors, and organic metals on wafers (abbreviated as wafers).
It is designed to process more than 1,000 wafers at once.

The processing furnaces include horizontal furnaces in which the furnaces are arranged horizontally, and vertical furnaces in which the furnaces are arranged vertically. Recently, vertical furnaces have been attracting attention because they require less installation space.

The mechanism for processing using this vertical furnace is shown in FIG.

A loading mechanism for vertically raising a mounting table, such as a boat, for transporting wafers into the vertical furnace processing apparatus, such as a CVD apparatus, is provided. A large number of wafers are mounted on the boat at predetermined intervals.

One reactor is provided above the loading mechanism of the boat with its length direction being vertical. Such a vertical furnace is maintained in a vertical state by the loading mechanism and delivered to and from the conveyor, and is lifted upward and installed in the reactor, so there are no obstacles near the loading mechanism. The area is surrounded by metal, except for the transfer port, to prevent objects from getting close to it.

Therefore, in this metal-enclosed loading area, the boat receiver may be improperly transferred, and the boat may fall along with the wafers to the bottom surface. It is common for an operator to remove the fallen bows and wafers in a dark loading area where there is almost no irradiation.

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) However, the above-described processing apparatus in which the loading area is surrounded by metal has the following problems.

First, since the outer circumference of the loading area is surrounded by metal, the illumination light that is illuminated outside the loading area is blocked by the metal. Therefore, it was difficult to visually inspect the boat received from the transport system during the process of attaching it to one reaction tube.

Next, even if the above-mentioned prediction is made, unlike a horizontal furnace where the reaction tube is placed horizontally, there is a large element of instability in terms of when the reaction tube will collapse, so the timing of transport may be poor and the boat may be damaged. It may fall to the bottom.

In this case, the boat is made of quartz material, and there is a drawback that an operator may be injured by the quartz material pieces and wafer fragments when performing removal work in a dark place.

The present invention has been made to address the above-mentioned problems, and allows visual inspection of the transportation status of unprocessed objects passing through the loading area*Ii! 4, thereby making it easier to remove damaged objects such as unprocessed objects and improving workability.

[Structure of the invention]

(Means for Solving the Problems) The present invention includes an airtight processing section that performs a predetermined processing on an object to be processed;
In the processing apparatus, the processing unit is equipped with a loading area and a transport means for transporting the object to be processed, and is shielded so as to isolate at least the loading area from the surroundings. It is characterized by the installation of lighting in the isolated space of the loading area.

(Function and Effect) According to the present invention, by providing the illumination light in the loading area where the object to be processed passes, it is possible to easily visually observe the passing condition of the object to be processed, and thereby Post-processing caused by body passage problems can be easily carried out, and therefore workability can be improved when performing post-processing due to these problems.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example in which the apparatus of the present invention is applied to a vertical CVD apparatus that batch-processes a large number of semiconductor wafers at the same time will be described with reference to the drawings.

As shown in Fig. 2, the above-mentioned apparatus consists of a processing section (2) consisting of a reaction tube (2) whose axis is vertical in a vertical reactor, and a large number of objects to be processed that are inserted into this processing section (2). A loading stage, such as a boat (A), on which the semiconductor wafer ■ is mounted is placed in the reaction tube ■ from a predetermined position below the processing section ■.
The loading area 0 is provided with a vertical movement mechanism (2) for loading and unloading.

The processing section (2) is provided with a reaction tube (2) having a double-tube structure and made of a heat-resistant material that does not easily react with the processing gas, such as quartz. That is, this reaction tube (2) is composed of a cylindrical outer tube (1a) whose upper surface is sealed and an inner tube (1b) that is not in contact with the inside of this outer tube (1a). A cylindrical heating mechanism, for example, a heater (2) wound in a coil shape, is provided so as to coaxially surround such a reaction tube (G). This heater (2) is connected to a heating mechanism, such as an AC power source (not shown), which uniformly heats the area on which the wafer (2) is placed to a predetermined temperature, for example, 500 to 1000°C. That is, by applying electric power from this AC power source, the heater (2) heats up.

In addition, inside the inner tube (1b) of the reaction tube
) for supplying a predetermined processing gas to the section (8).
) are connected.

This gas supply pipe (8) is connected to a gas supply line via a mass flow controller (not shown) or the like. Further, an exhaust pipe (2) is connected to the outer tube (1a) of the reaction tube (1).

This exhaust pipe (9) is equipped with a vacuum pump (not shown) capable of reducing the inside of the reaction tube 0 to a desired pressure and discharging process gas, etc.
It is connected to the.

That is, when the processing gas is supplied into the reaction tube (1), the processing gas flows from the lower part of the inner tube (1b) to the upper part, and at this time, it processes the wafer (2) and then makes a U-turn toward the upper outer tube (1a) The water flows out from the upper part of the outer tube (1a) toward the lower part.

A lid (10) is detachably provided so as to keep the inside of the reaction tube ω configured as described above airtight. Above the lid (10), a boat (A) carrying wafers (2) is placed in a one-sided immersion type. This boat (a)
A large number of wafers, for example about 100 to 150 wafers, can be mounted at predetermined intervals in the original horizontal direction.

The boat (A) can be set at a predetermined height position within the reaction tube (G), and a heat insulating cylinder (11) for preventing heat from escaping inside the reaction tube (ω) is installed in the boat (I). ) and the lid (10).

Here, the lid body (10) is supported by a vertical movement mechanism (c), which includes a vertical movement mechanism, for example, a ball screw connected to a drive motor, and a nut threadedly connected to the ball screw.

That is, the boat (A) has a processing section (2) and a heating cylinder (11
) on top of which a boat (a) is transferred by means of a transport device (not shown) that moves in the horizontal direction.

The driving of the conveying device is controlled by a control section.

In such a device, a boat ←) transferred from a transport device (not shown) is a vertical motor 4i! ! A barrier, such as an aluminum plate, is provided around the space to prevent obstacles from entering the space raised by (1), that is, the loading area 0.

The characteristic configuration of this embodiment is shown in FIG. The reason is that the loading area (0) surrounded by the aluminum plate is configured to be illuminated.

That is, the loading area (2) has a loading entrance (1) through which the boat (A) is loaded and unloaded by a transport mechanism (not shown).
2), and a maintenance opening (1) that is opened and closed when performing maintenance on the loading area (0).
3), a surface on which the vertical movement mechanism ■ for attaching the boat (A) to the reaction tube ■ is installed on the side, and a west side of the side used to isolate it from the surroundings. It is composed of

An illumination lamp, for example, a fluorescent lamp (14) is provided on the loading entrance (12) side, for example, on the right side, in parallel with the plane in which both ends of the vertical movement mechanism (1) of the loading area 0 are provided on the vertical side.

The fluorescent lamp (14) has a lighting circuit formed by opening 1 (13a) of the maintenance opening/closing port (13) and a lighting circuit which is manually switched on as an OR circuit.

Next, a film forming process on a wafer using the above-mentioned CVD apparatus will be explained.

First, the wafer (■) is loaded onto the boat (A) using a wafer changing device (not shown). Then, this boat (A) is transported to the loading area (0) using a boat transport device (not shown). That is, the boat (A) is placed on the loading area (warm fi(u) set to 0). .

Then, the boat (A) is raised by a predetermined amount by the transport mechanism (C) and carried into a predetermined position within the reaction tube (G) without contacting the inner wall of the reaction tube (2). At this time, by bringing the lower end of the reaction tube (1) into contact with the lid (10), the position of the wafer is automatically determined and the inside of the reaction tube (1) is made airtight. Next, the inside of the reaction tube ω is set to a desired low pressure state, for example, 0.1 to 3 Torr.
Evacuation is controlled by a vacuum pump (not shown) to maintain the temperature at r.

Further, electric power is applied to the heater (2) in advance, and the heater (2) is set at a desired temperature, for example, about 500 to 1000°C. and,
After the above settings, while controlling the exhaust gas and adjusting the flow rate using a mass flow controller (not shown) from the gas supply source, process gases such as SiH4 and 0□ are supplied to the inner tube (1b) of the reaction tube (■).
The gas is supplied from the gas supply pipe (8) for a predetermined period of time. Then, on the surface of the wafer (3) placed in the inner tube (1b) of the reaction tube (1), a Sin film shown in the following formula (2) is deposited.

SiH, + 0□→Sin, + 282↑ ・・・
... ■Also, the treated gas is exhausted from the exhaust pipe (9) connected to the outer pipe (1a) through a predetermined route. After this CVD treatment, the supply of the processing gas is stopped, and the inside of the reaction tube (1) is replaced with an inert gas, such as N2 gas, to return to normal pressure. Then, the boat (A) loaded with the wafers (3) after the above processing is transported to the loading area 0 by the transport mechanism (2), and the processing is completed.

The characteristic effects of this embodiment will be explained.

A boat (with a large number of wafers ■ mounted inside the reaction tube ■
Since the fluorescent lamp (14) is on, the loading process can be easily visually observed.The loading status can be grasped through this visual observation, and if a malfunction is recognized, the loading drive can be started instantly. can be made to correspond to

Furthermore, if the transfer receiver ends up being improperly handed over and the boat (to) carrying the wafers falls onto the lower surface of the isolated area and breaks, this broken piece can be easily removed.

As described above, this embodiment includes a secret processing section that performs predetermined processing on objects to be processed, and a loading area that transports objects to be processed to this processing section, and at least the loading area. The processing equipment is shielded so as to be isolated from the surroundings, and lighting lights are installed in the loading area through which the objects to be processed pass, so that the isolated loading area can be illuminated and the boat carrying the wafers can be illuminated. The transport process of the boat can be grasped, which prevents the boat from becoming unstable and improves work efficiency.

The present invention is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiments, but can be applied to various processing apparatuses such as annealing apparatuses for acid expansion and oxidation apparatuses, heat treatment apparatuses such as epitaxial growth apparatuses, and sputtering, etching, and ion injection apparatuses.

Further, although the above-mentioned illumination lamp has been described using a fluorescent lamp, the present invention is not limited to this, and any illumination means used as illumination, such as a light bulb, an illuminator, or illumination using glass fiber, may be used.

Furthermore, although it has been described that the fluorescent nails are attached to the surface on which the vertical movement mechanism is installed on the side, the present invention is not limited to this, and there is no problem in providing the illumination section in a place where it is most visible.

Furthermore, although the object to be processed has been explained using a wafer, it is not limited to this; the liquid crystal screen (LCD screen), which is famous for television screens (
or a liquid crystal display device).

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional explanatory view of a loading area for explaining an illumination lamp device of the apparatus of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional explanatory view of a vertical CVD apparatus for explaining an embodiment of the apparatus shown in FIG. 2... Processing section 5... Vertical movement mechanism 6.
... Loading area 12 ... Loading entrance 13 ...
Maintenance opening/closing port 14...Fluorescent lamp Figure 1 Patent applicant Chill Sagami Co., Ltd. 5rg Tsujiyobuta

Claims (1)

[Claims] The processing unit is equipped with an airtight processing section for processing the object to be processed in a predetermined manner, and a loading area in which a conveying means for transporting the object to be processed is arranged in the processing section, and at least the loading area is isolated from the surroundings. In a shielded processing device,
A processing apparatus characterized in that a lighting lamp is provided in an isolated space of the loading area through which the object to be processed passes.