JPH03272155A - Control of wafer transfer device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To contrive to reduce manpower by a method wherein a wafer transfer device is subjected to control that when a wafer is not separated from a positioning member by the blow-off of gas for backward transfer, the blow-off of gas for forward transfer is performed for a while and thereafter, the blow-off of the gas for backward transfer is performed. CONSTITUTION:A wafer W finishes a treatment at a wafer treatment part 5, gas 4 for backward carrying-out the wafer W is blown off through tilted holes 3 and the wafer W is transferred backward. If about 10 seconds elapse and when the wafer W is not transferred backward without being separated from a positioning member 6 even after the about 10 seconds, the blow-off of the gas 4 for backward transfer is once standstilled and gas 4 for forward transfer is blown off through tilted holes 2. By this operation, the wafer W is transferred backward by the gas 4 after the adhesion of the wafer W to the member 6 is peeled, but when the wafer W is not stepped backward again, the operation is repeated and when the operation is repeated many times, an alarm is issued and a measure is taken by hands. Thereby, manpower is reduced and the throughput of a treatment can be improved.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Summary] Forward transport in which the wafer is advanced until it comes into contact with a positioning member provided in the wafer processing section, and backward transport in which the wafer that is in contact with the positioning member is pulled back are carried out on the transport path surface. Regarding a method of controlling a wafer transport device using gas blowing out from an inclined hole provided in The purpose is to peel off the adhesive and perform backward transport. When the wafer gets stuck in the gas blowout during backward transport and does not separate from the positioning member, the gas blowout for forward transport is temporarily performed and then the backward transport is performed. The configuration is such that the wafer is transported backwards by blowing out gas.

[Industrial application field]

The present invention relates to a method for controlling a wafer transfer device, and in particular,
The transport path is equipped with forward transport for advancing the wafer until it comes into contact with a positioning member provided in the wafer processing section, and backward transport for pulling back the wafer that is in contact with the positioning member. The present invention relates to the case of a wafer transfer device that is operated by.

The wafer processing section is a wafer placement section such as a wafer alignment device or an exposure device,
The wafer transfer device is used to automate the loading and unloading of wafers into and out of the wafer processing section.

Therefore, it is important that this transport device does not cause transport errors.

[Conventional technology]

FIGS. 3(a) to 3(e) are side views for explaining the wafer transfer device.

In the figure, W is a wafer, ■ is a conveyance path surface for conveying the wafer W, 2 and 3 are inclined holes provided in the conveyance path surface 1 and blows out gas 4 at any time, 5 is the wafer processing section mentioned above, and 6 is a positioning member provided in the wafer processing section 5;
It is. The wafer processing section 5 is located at one end of the transport path surface 1, and the gas 4 blown out from the inclined hole 2 is connected to the wafer processing section 5.
The gas 4 blowing out from the inclined hole 3 is directed toward the side opposite to the gas 4 blowing out from the inclined hole 2. The timing of these four gas blowouts is controlled by a control device (not shown).

Then, as shown in (a), the wafer W is transported forward on the transport path surface 1 toward the wafer processing section 5 by blowing out gas 4 from the inclined hole 2, and the wafer W is placed on the positioning member 6 as shown in (b). The wafer W comes into contact with the wafer W and stops there, and then the blowing out of the gas 4 for forward transport is stopped and the wafer W is carried into the wafer processing section 5 as shown in (C).

After finishing the processing of the wafer W in the wafer processing section 5, as shown in (d) to (e), the wafer W is transported backwards by blowing out gas 4 from the inclined hole 3 and taken out from the wafer processing section 5. do.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

By the way, even if 4 gases are blown out from the diagonal hole 3 during backward conveyance for the above-mentioned carrying out,
There may be a case where the wafer W does not leave the positioning member 6 and the backward transport is not carried out.

Considering the processing content of the wafer processing unit 5, the wafer W is often coated with a resist, and the resist causes the wafer W to stick to the positioning member 6, causing the wafer W to stick to the positioning member 6, as shown in FIG. This is considered to be because the blowing out of the gas 4 during backward conveyance simply causes the side of the wafer W opposite to the positioning member 6 to float due to the blowing direction.

The present invention provides the above-mentioned wafer transport device, in which even if the wafer W brought into contact with the positioning member 6 causes some adhesion between the wafer W and the positioning member 6, the adhesion is removed during backward transport of the wafer W. The purpose is to enable backward transportation to be carried out.

[Means to solve the problem]

The above purpose is to perform forward transport in which the wafer advances until it comes into contact with a positioning member provided in the wafer processing section, and backward transport in which the wafer that is in contact with the positioning member is pulled back. In a wafer transfer device using gas blowing, when the wafer does not move away from the positioning member due to the gas blowing during backward transfer, the gas is temporarily blown for forward transfer, and then the gas is blown for backward transfer to perform backward transfer to the wafer. This is achieved by the method of controlling a wafer transfer apparatus of the present invention.

[For production]

The above-mentioned inclined hole corresponds to the above-mentioned inclined hole 2 or 3, and the gas blowout for the forward conveyance is directed toward the positioning member side like the gas 4 blowout from the inclined hole 2, and the above-mentioned backward conveyance The gas blowout is directed to the side opposite to the gas blowout of the forward conveyance, similar to the gas blowout from the inclined hole 3.

Therefore, when blowing gas for forward transport onto a wafer that is in contact with the positioning member, a strong floating blade acts on the contact area of the wafer with the positioning member due to the direction of the blowout, and the contact area is slightly affected by the blowing direction. Even if some adhesion occurs, the adhesion will be peeled off. For this reason, the subsequent gas blowing during backward transport facilitates backward transport of the wafer.

〔Example〕

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2. FIGS. 1(a) to (d) are side views for explaining the embodiment, and FIG. 2 is a control flowchart of the embodiment, and the same reference numerals indicate the same objects throughout the plan.

In this embodiment, in the wafer transfer device described above,
Gas 4 when carrying out the wafer W from the wafer processing section 5
This is a change to the balloon procedure.

That is, in FIGS. 1(a) to 1(a), (a) shows a state in which the wafer W has been processed in the wafer processing section 5 and is waiting to be carried out. To unload the wafer W, first, four gases are blown out for backward unloading as in the conventional case. If this causes the wafer W to be transported backwards, that is fine.

If <(b), which is the same as in FIG. 4, and the wafer W does not move away from the positioning member 6 and backward transport is not performed even after approximately 10 seconds have elapsed, the gas 4 blowout for backward transport is temporarily stopped. Then, as shown in (C), blow out 4 gases for forward transport for about 10 seconds to remove the adhesive from the positioning member 6 of the wafer W, and then blow out 4 gases for backward transport again as shown in (d). Then, the wafer W is transported backwards. If (b) is reproduced despite the four gas blowouts in (d), the process returns to (C).

In addition, if the reproduction of ('b) is repeated many times, an alarm for removal of fruits is issued and a worker is called to take measures. The number of times (b) is to be repeated before an alarm is issued is set in consideration of the processing content and operating status of the wafer processing section 5, and is suitably about three times, for example.

The control flowchart of FIG. 2 illustrates the process described above.

In order to carry out the operation up to the point of issuing an alarm unmanned, the wafer transport device is provided with an appropriate wafer detection sensor, and the above-mentioned blowing out of the gas 4 and the issuing of the alarm are controlled by a control device (not shown).

The configuration of this control device is included in ordinary well-known technology, so a description thereof will be omitted.

The present inventor discovered that by switching the control as in the embodiment, the automatic unloading rate for unloading wafers W from the wafer processing section 5 was 60% in the past, and workers were called very frequently due to unloading errors. By increasing the automatic unloading rate to about 100%, it was possible to almost eliminate calls for workers due to unloading errors, and at the same time, it was possible to significantly improve the processing throughput of the wafer processing section 5.

Note that the detection time for non-execution of backward conveyance in FIG. 1 (B) and the time for blowing out four gases for forward conveyance in FIG. You can set it to .

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, according to the present invention, the forward transport in which the wafer is advanced until it comes into contact with the positioning member provided in the wafer processing section, and the backward transport in which the wafer that is in contact with the positioning member is pulled back are carried out on the transport path. In a wafer transfer device that uses gas blowing out from an inclined hole provided in a wafer, even if a wafer that is brought into contact with a positioning member causes some adhesion to the positioning member, the wafer is transported backwards to remove the adhesion. The wafer can be peeled off and transported backwards, which has the effect of reducing the labor of the operator and improving the processing throughput of the wafer processing section.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figures 1 (a) to (d) are side views for explaining the embodiment, Figure 2 is a control flowchart of the embodiment, and Figure 3 (a).
-(e) are side views for explaining the wafer transfer device, and FIG. 4 is a side view for explaining problems. In the figure, 1 is a transport path surface, 23 is an inclined hole, 4 is a gas, 5 is a wafer processing section, 6 is a positioning member, and W is a wafer. 1 JP-A-3 272155 (5)

Claims (1)

[Claims] Forward transport in which the wafer is advanced until it comes into contact with a positioning member provided in the wafer processing section, and backward transport in which the wafer that is in contact with the positioning member is pulled back are controlled by an inclined hole provided in the transport path surface. In a wafer transfer device that performs gas blowing from a wafer, when the wafer does not move away from the positioning member due to gas blowing during backward transfer, the wafer is moved backward by temporarily blowing gas during forward transfer and then blowing gas during backward transfer. A method for controlling a wafer transfer device, the method comprising causing the wafer transfer device to perform transfer.