JP2740848B2 - Vertical heat treatment equipment - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Object of the Invention] (Field of Industrial Application) The present invention relates to a vertical heat treatment apparatus.

(Prior Art) Conventionally, as a heat treatment apparatus used in a semiconductor manufacturing process, a horizontal heat treatment apparatus in which a reaction furnace main body is disposed substantially horizontally has been used. In recent years, a reaction furnace main body has been disposed substantially vertically. Vertical heat treatment apparatuses have been used.

That is, in the vertical heat treatment apparatus, for example, a reaction furnace body formed of a cylindrical reaction tube made of quartz or the like and a resistance heating heater, a soaking tube, and a heat insulating material provided so as to surround the periphery thereof is substantially vertical. It is arranged in. Then, a desired process is performed by loading / unloading a plurality of substrate holders for heat treatment, for example, semiconductor wafers arranged in a quartz wafer boat from the lower part of the reactor body. Such a vertical heat treatment apparatus has advantages such that the inner wall of the reaction tube and the wafer boat can be loaded and unloaded without contact, the occupied area is small, and the diameter of the processed semiconductor wafer can be easily increased.

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) However, even in such a vertical heat treatment apparatus, it is desired to further reduce the installation area and improve the space factor.

The present invention has been made in view of such a conventional situation, and an object thereof is to provide a vertical heat treatment apparatus capable of reducing an installation area as compared with the related art and improving a space factor. It is.

[Structure of the Invention] (Means for Solving the Problems) That is, a vertical heat treatment apparatus of the present invention is provided with two reactor main bodies arranged substantially vertically, and provided at a lower portion of the reactor main body, respectively, A lifting / lowering mechanism for vertically moving a processing substrate holder mounted on the reactor to load / unload the reactor main body; provided between the reactor main bodies, along an arrangement direction of the reactor main body. And a slide arm having a multi-stage structure that can be moved linearly and is provided between the reaction furnace main body, and a plurality of transfer substrate holders can be placed along the moving direction of the slide arm. A housing portion, which is locked to the slide arm, and along the moving direction of the slide arm, between the elevating mechanism and a predetermined transfer position corresponding to each of the transfer substrate holders. Transport mechanism for transporting substrate holders The transfer arm is fixed to the slide arm and is movable between predetermined transfer positions corresponding to the respective transfer substrate holders, and is disposed between the processing substrate holder and the transfer substrate holder at the transfer position. And a transfer mechanism capable of transferring the substrate to be processed to and from the substrate holder.

(Operation) In the vertical heat treatment apparatus of the present invention having the above configuration, one transfer device is shared by two reactor bodies, so that the installation area can be reduced as compared with the conventional case, and the space factor can be improved. Can be achieved.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

The housing 1 is composed of, for example, three housings 1a, 1b, and 1c which are provided so as to be connected in the horizontal direction along the boundary of the clean room. The two reactor main bodies 2a and 2b, which are constituted by a reaction tube formed into a cylindrical shape from the above and a resistance heater provided so as to surround the periphery thereof, a soaking tube, a heat insulating material, and the like, are disposed substantially vertically. I have. In addition, these reactor main bodies 2a, 2b
In the lower part of the main body, boat elevators 5a and 5b are provided in the reactor main bodies 2a and 2b as mechanisms for loading and unloading a large number of semiconductor wafers 4 mounted on the wafer boat 3, respectively.

Further, the central housing 1b is provided with a wafer set accommodation section 7 configured to be able to mount a plurality of, for example, four wafer cassettes 6a to 6d. In the housing 1b, a transfer mechanism 8 for transferring the semiconductor wafers 4 from the wafer cassettes 6a to 6d to the wafer boat 3, a support mechanism 9 for supporting the wafer boat 3 substantially vertically, and A drive mechanism 10 for moving the transfer mechanism 8 and the support mechanism 9 is provided.

The support mechanism 9 includes, as shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, a lower support portion 11 that grips a lower portion of the wafer boat 3,
Wafer boat 3 by upper supporting part 12 pressing the upper part
Is held substantially vertically at a predetermined position.
The support mechanism 9 is connected to the drive mechanism 10 via an arm 15 having a drive mechanism 14 for driving in the direction of arrow Y shown in FIG.

The drive mechanism 10 is provided with two slide arms 20 and 21 which can be extended and contracted in the direction of arrow X shown in FIG. 4 by guide rails 17, respectively. Slide arm
The motors 20 and 21 are driven by motors 23 and 24 and ball screws 25 and 26 as driving mechanisms, respectively. Also,
The arm 15 is provided with a slide arm 20 as shown in FIG.
Slide arm by the belt 27 provided between
It is configured to move on the slide arm 21 following the movement of the 21.

The transfer mechanism 8 includes a wafer holding unit 28 that suction-holds the semiconductor wafer 4 by, for example, a vacuum chuck, and a transfer driving unit 29 that drives the wafer holding unit 28 to perform a transfer operation. . The transfer drive unit 29 is connected to the slide arm 20 and is configured to be able to move along the wafer cassette accommodating unit 7 by 600 mm in the X direction shown in the figure. This corresponds to a desired one of the wafer cassettes 6a to 6d placed in the wafer cassette accommodating section 7.
This is because the transfer mechanism 8 is positioned in front of the wafer cassettes 6a to 6d so that the semiconductor wafers 4 can be taken out or stored in the wafer cassettes 6a to 6d.

Further, the wafer cassette accommodating portion 7 is connected to, for example, a driving mechanism, and detects an orientation flat of the semiconductor wafer 4 by a rotatable roller or the like, and performs alignment. After the alignment of the wafers 4, the wafer cassettes 6 a to 6 d are set so that the surface of each semiconductor wafer 4 is substantially horizontal.
6d is rotated by approximately 90 degrees, and a wafer cassette rotating mechanism 31 enabling the transfer mechanism 8 to take out the semiconductor wafer 4
Is provided.

In the vertical heat treatment apparatus having the above structure, for example, a wafer for processing for the reaction furnace main body 2a is previously stored in the wafer cassette 6a, a dummy wafer for the reaction furnace main body 2a is stored in the wafer cassette 6b, and the processing for the reaction furnace main body 2b is stored in the cassette 6d. A dummy wafer for the reaction furnace main body 2b is stored in the wafer for wafer and the wafer cassette 6c.

After the alignment of the semiconductor wafer 4 by the alignment mechanism 30, the rotation of the semiconductor wafer 4 is performed by the rotation mechanism 31.
Wafer cassettes 6a to 6d so that the surfaces of
Rotate 90 degrees. Thereafter, the wafer cassette 6a is transferred to the wafer boat 3 supported by the support mechanism 9 by the transfer device 8.
6d, the semiconductor wafers 4 are transferred one by one. Thereafter, the drive mechanism 10 places the wafer boat 3 on the boat elevators 5a, 5b, and loads the wafer boats 3 into the reactor main bodies 2a, 2b by the boat elevators 5a, 5b to perform processing of the semiconductor wafer 4, for example, silicon epitaxial growth. . Also,
The loading and unloading of the wafer boat 3 containing such semiconductor wafers 4 is alternately performed between the reactor main bodies 2a and 2b by the above-described transport mechanism. For example, while processing is performed in the reactor main body 2a, Load and unload operations of the reactor main body 2b are performed.

That is, in the vertical heat treatment apparatus of this embodiment described above, one transfer device 8 and support mechanism 9 provided between the reactor main bodies 2a and 2b are shared by the two reactor main bodies 2a and 2b. At the same time, the transfer device 8 and the support mechanism 9 are driven by one drive device 10. Therefore, the size of the device can be reduced, the installation area can be reduced as compared with the related art, and the space factor can be improved. Further, since the transfer device 8 and the support mechanism 9 are moved on the slide arm 20 by the slide arm 21, the relative positional relationship between the transfer device 8 and the support mechanism 9 does not change, and the transfer is reliably performed. It can be carried out.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the vertical heat treatment apparatus of the present invention, the installation area can be reduced as compared with the related art, and the space factor can be improved.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a top view showing a configuration of a vertical heat treatment apparatus according to one embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a front view of FIG. 1, and FIG. 3 shows a main part of the vertical heat treatment apparatus of FIG. FIG. 4 is a front view of FIG. 3, and FIG. 5 is an enlarged top view showing a main part of the drive mechanism shown in FIG. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Housing | casing, 2a, 2b ... Reactor main body, 3 ... Wafer boat, 4 ... Semiconductor wafer, 5a, 5b ... Boat elevator, 6a-6d ... Wafer cassette, 7 ... Wafer cassette accommodation part , 8 ... Transfer mechanism, 9 ... Support mechanism, 10 ... Drive mechanism.

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] 1. A reaction furnace comprising: two reaction furnace bodies disposed substantially vertically; and a processing substrate holder provided at a lower part of the reaction furnace body and mounted on an upper part thereof, which is moved up and down. An elevating mechanism for loading / unloading the main body, a slide arm having a multi-stage structure provided between the reactor main bodies and linearly movable along an arrangement direction of the reactor main bodies; A receiving portion provided between the furnace main bodies and capable of mounting a plurality of transfer substrate holders along the moving direction of the slide arm; Along with the lifting mechanism, a transport mechanism for transporting the processing substrate holder between predetermined transfer positions according to the respective transport substrate holders, and Of the transfer substrate holder Moving the freely between the predetermined transfer position,
A transfer mechanism capable of transferring the substrate to be processed between the processing substrate holder and the transfer substrate holder disposed at the transfer position. apparatus.