JPH02243881A - Highly clean room - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To surely maintain cleanliness by forming a plurality of holes on a partitioning means and installing a control means and freely adjusting the opening and closing of at least one hole, in a highly clean room in which a manufacturing device in a clean room is partitioning by the partitioning means. CONSTITUTION:A step difference 1a is formed on the upper surface of a manufacturing device 1, and covered by a cover 2, and a current straightening plate 12 is installed inside the cover 2. Further, a plurality of holes 13 are formed at the position opposed to the side surface of the manufacturing device 1 in the both side lower parts of the cover 2. The clean air formed in a clean air unit 3 is introduced into the cover 2, and allowed to flow downward by the action of the current straightening plate 12. While, the holes 13 at the high height position of the machine device 1 are opened perfectly, and the holes 13 at the lower height position are opened alternately, and others are closed perfectly. Therefore, air stream flows in the aslant direction from the lower height side of the machine device 1 to the higher side, and an eddy current region is reduced, and dusts can be speedily discharged outside.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a high-clean room that locally cleans the vicinity of manufacturing equipment for semiconductors, magnetic disks, etc., which is provided in the clean room.

[Conventional technology]

When manufacturing semiconductor devices, as semiconductor devices become highly integrated, preventing dust from adhering to wafers during the manufacturing process has become an important issue in order to ensure yields. For example, in the case of a 4-megabit DRAM, it is said that if dust with a particle size of approximately 0.1 μm or more adheres to the wafer, it will lead to a decrease in yield. As the degree of integration of manufactured devices increases, even the smallest particles of dust become the cause of such problems, so improving the cleanliness of semiconductor manufacturing spaces will become an increasingly important technical issue in the future. Since semiconductor manufacturing is performed in a clean room, the clean room, which is the manufacturing space, needs to have a high level of cleanliness.

On the other hand, there are many dust generation sources in a clean room, such as workers and various devices. In a clean room, dust generated from these dust sources is quickly carried out of the clean room by air currents, but in areas where workers frequently come and go, cleanliness inevitably decreases. Therefore, it is difficult to uniformly maintain a high degree of cleanliness within a clean room. For this reason, in the clean room, especially in areas near the manufacturing equipment, where wafers are always present.

Efforts have been made to ensure a cleaner atmosphere than other locations.

One such method is to surround the entire manufacturing apparatus as shown in FIG. In the figure, the upper part of the manufacturing apparatus 1 is covered with a cover 2, and clean air generated by a clean air unit 3 flows into the cover 2 from an inlet 4 as shown by an arrow 35. . For this reason, the pressure inside the cover 2 becomes higher than that outside, and air flows out from the gap between the cover 2 and the device 1 as shown by an arrow 41. Therefore, the inside of the cover 2 is always maintained at a higher level of cleanliness than the outside.

Another method is shown in FIG. In the figure, clean air is sent into a tunnel-type clean room 5 via a filter unit 6. At this time,
The amount of air sent to the equipment area 7 where the manufacturing equipment N1 is placed as shown by arrow 42 is made larger than the amount of air sent to the work area 8 where workers come and go as shown by arrow 43. Therefore, the equipment area 7 has a positive pressure relative to the working area 8, and airflow flows from the equipment area 7 toward the working area 8 as shown by arrow 44 from the gap between the partition 9 that partitions the equipment area 7 and the manufacturing equipment 1. ing. The partition 9 also prevents turbulence in the work area airflow that occurs when a worker passes through the work area 8 from propagating to the equipment area 7. This method also prevents contaminated air from the work area 8 from entering the equipment area 7,
The cleanliness of the device area 7 can be maintained. Note that the clean room 5 is provided with a grating floor 10 and a lower floor 11.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

However, in the above-mentioned conventional technology, sufficient consideration was not always given to the prompt removal of dust generated by the device itself, and as a result, there was a problem in that the cleanliness around the device could not be maintained. .

The cause of such a problem will be explained with reference to FIGS. 13 and 14. FIG. 13 shows a case where a mechanical device 1 having a step 1a on the upper surface is covered with a cover 2, and in this case, a vortex area 45 is formed at the step 1a. Further, FIG. 14 is a view of the equipment area 7 in the clean room 5 viewed from the working area 8 side shown in FIG. 12, and a vortex region 45 is formed due to the difference in height between the equipments 1.

When the vortex area 45 is formed as described above, if dust enters this area, it will accumulate, reducing the cleanliness near the apparatus 1 and increasing the possibility of dust contamination of the wafer. It ends up.

Further, in the above-mentioned conventional technology, the airflow distribution inside the cover 2 or inside the device area 7 of the clean room 5 is not dynamically controlled depending on the operating state of the device 1 inside, which leads to a decrease in the cleanliness of the inside. There was also the problem that something happened.

That is, depending on the device, the amount of dust generated from a specific part may increase during a specific operating state. In such a case, it is desirable to prevent the generated dust from dispersing by allowing airflow to flow into this area from the surrounding area, but conventionally such control has not been performed.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and it is an object of the present invention to provide a high-cleanliness room that can quickly discharge dust generated from equipment in a clean room to the outside and reliably maintain cleanliness within the equipment area. With the goal.

[Means to solve the problem]

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention provides a highly clean room in which a manufacturing device installed in a clean room is partitioned by a partition means, and highly clean air is introduced into the interior.
A plurality of holes are formed in the partition means to communicate between the inside and the outside, and a control means is provided for opening and closing at least one of the holes.

[Effect]

According to the above configuration, by selectively opening and closing a plurality of holes formed in the partition means or controlling the degree of opening, the distribution of the air outflow from the inside of the partition means to the outside is controlled. This makes it possible to maintain a good internal airflow condition without swirling. Therefore, even if the manufacturing equipment has a stepped part, the gap between the manufacturing equipment and the partition means varies depending on the part, or the direction of contaminated air flow is in a specific direction depending on the operating state of the manufacturing equipment, , this airflow is directed in the proper direction without creating vortices in the airflow.

〔Example〕

An embodiment of the high cleanliness chamber according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

A first embodiment of the present invention is shown in FIGS. 1 to 3. In the figure, parts that are the same or equivalent to those of the conventional example shown in FIG. 10 are denoted by the same reference numerals. The manufacturing equipment 1 is approximately 1 m high and approximately 2 m wide, and has a step on the top surface as shown in Figure 1.
There is a. Most of the upper surface of this device 1 is covered with a cover 2, and a rectifying plate 12 is provided inside the cover 2.

Further, a clean air unit 3 is connected between the upper surface of the cover 2 and the rectifying plate 12 via a clean air inlet 4 . A plurality of holes 13 are formed in a straight line along the lower edge at positions facing the sides of the manufacturing apparatus 1 at the lower sides of the cover 2, and in this embodiment, the diameter of these holes 13 is approximately 3 mm.
, the interval is approximately 7 an. As shown in FIGS. 2 to 4, the front surfaces of these holes 13 are provided with lids 15, one end of which is rotatably supported on a support shaft 14. As shown, the hole 13 is fully opened. Further, a fixed shaft 16 is attached to each cover 2 at the upper position of the hole 13, and when the cover 15 is rotated 180 degrees to fully open the hole 13 as shown in FIG. 16 allows the lid 15 to be locked.

Next, the operation of this embodiment configured as described above will be explained. The clean air generated by the clean air unit 3 flows into the cover 2 through the clean air inlet 4, and flows downward from the ceiling almost uniformly over the entire surface by the action of the rectifying plate 12. Also hole 1
3, the holes 13 in the higher parts of the mechanical device 1 are completely open as shown by the white circles, and every second hole 13 in the lower parts is fully open, and the others are fully open. It is fully closed as shown by the black circle. By doing this,
The airflow flows in a slightly diagonal direction from the lower side to the higher side of the mechanical device 1, forming a vortex area 45 as shown in FIG.
can be made smaller.

According to this embodiment, it is possible to reduce the vortex area 45 that occurs in the stepped portion 1a of the manufacturing equipment installed in a clean room, and the dust generated from the fruiting equipment 1 can be quickly removed without staying inside. It is discharged to the outside.

A second embodiment of the present invention is shown in FIGS. 5 to 7. In the figure, parts that are the same or equivalent to those of the conventional example shown in FIG. 12 are denoted by the same reference numerals. In this embodiment, the present invention is applied to a tunnel-type clean room 5, in which clean air flows downward from the ceiling as shown by arrows 42 and d, respectively, and flows through the device 7 where the device is installed and the other work area. 8
There is an inflow into the country. The equipment area 7 has a more positive pressure than the work area 8, and is separated by a partition 9. Further, the gap between the partition 9 and the device 1 is, for example, approximately 18 mm, and a perforated plate 17 as shown in FIG. 6 is provided at the lower end of this gap. This perforated plate 17
Holes 18 with a diameter of about 31 are provided in a straight line at intervals of about 7 cm, and these holes 18 can be plugged with plugs 19 as shown in FIG. 7, if necessary. . In addition, the grating floor 10 and the lower floor 11 are shown in FIG.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be explained. Adjacent manufacturing equipment 1 placed on grating floor 10 in clean room 5
b and lc are different in height, and when the height of the device 1b is lower than the height of the device IC, the hole 1 formed in the perforated plate 17 on the device 1c side among the perforated plates 17 provided on both sides of the device 1b.
8 are all open, and every other hole 18 formed in the perforated plate 17 on the opposite side is closed with a plug 19, for example. The same applies to the device IC. By doing so, the air current flowing from the front and rear surfaces of the device area 7 to the working area 8 can be adjusted. That is, the working area 8a on the rear side of the equipment area 7 is an air return part, and the working area 8b between the opposing equipment area 7 is an air inlet part, and the clean air sent from the ceiling is transferred to the arrow 42. As shown at 43, it enters the equipment area 7 and the work area 8b. This clean air further passes through the grating floor 10 and the perforated plate 17 under the partition 9 on the rear working area 8a side of the equipment area 7, and flows into this working area 8b. At this time, since the number of holes in the perforated plate 17 on the working area 8a side is approximately half the number of holes in the perforated plate 17 on the working area 8b side, the amount of air passing through each perforated plate 17 is controlled, and the first Effects similar to those of the embodiment can be obtained.

FIGS. 8 to 10 show a third embodiment of the present invention. This embodiment is an example in which a cover 21 is provided on the top of the photoresist apparatus 20. As shown in FIG. 8, the photoresist apparatus 20 includes a cassette 22 provided on the loader side and containing wafers, and a preprocessing section 2 that performs prebaking and the like.
3, a coating section 24 for spin-coating a resist solution, a post-processing section 25 for performing post-baking, etc., and an unloader-side cassette 26 for storing post-processed wafers. In addition, a plurality of holes 27 are formed in a straight line at the bottom of both sides of the cover 21, and each of these holes 27 is provided with a solenoid valve 28 as shown in FIG. 9 to open and close the hole 27. It looks like this. A rectifier plate 12 and a clean air outlet 4 are provided on the top of the cover 21, as in the first embodiment.

Further, as shown in FIG.
It consists of a chuck 30 that holds the chuck 30 by vacuum suction or the like, a drive shaft 31 that rotates the chuck 30 at high speed, and a coating cup 32 that can be lowered to cover the upper part of the coating section 24. The application cup 32 is raised and lowered, and the solenoid valve 2 described above is
The opening and closing of 8 is controlled by a sequence control section (not shown).

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be explained. Wafers are transported one by one on a transport surface 45 from a cassette 22 installed on the loader side, and are baked in a preprocessing section 23. Next, the coating cup 32 provided in the coating section 24 is raised from the transfer surface 45 by a drive mechanism (not shown), and the wafer 29 is mounted and fixed on the chuck 30 through the gap therebetween. After applying the photoresist liquid 33 onto the wafer 29, the application cup 32 is lowered and the drive shaft 31 is rotated at high speed to make the photoresist liquid uniform in thickness. When the rotational coating on one wafer 29 is completed, the rotation of the drive shaft 31 is stopped and the coating cup 32 is raised. The wafer 29 is then transported to the post-processing section 25, and the next wafer 29 enters the coating section 24.

Finally, after being post-baked in the post-processing section 25, it is stored in a cassette 26 on the unloader side.

In the process of applying the photoresist liquid 33 in the application section 24 described above, a large number of resist liquid droplets are present inside the application cup 32 . During spin coating, the rotation of the wafer 29 induces an airflow from the upper inner surface of the coating cup 32 toward the surface of the wafer 29. Therefore, the resist liquid droplets do not flow out to the outside, but when the wafer 29 decelerates just before it stops rotating, and immediately after the rotation stops, especially when the coating cup 32 rises, the resist liquid droplets 34 inside the coating cup 32 leak to the outside. Outflow, cassette 22, 26, pre-processing section 23, post-processing section 2
There is a possibility that the wafer 29 located at 5 etc. may be contaminated.

On the other hand, the application part 24 is covered with a cover 21, and clean air flows into the cover 21 from the inlet 4, and the rectifying plate 1
2, it flows downward almost uniformly over the entire surface. Also cover 2
1 is provided with a hole 27 that is opened and closed by a solenoid valve 28 as described above. Normally, all of these holes 27 are open, and the air flows uniformly inside the cover 21 from top to bottom. , flows out from the hole 27.

However, as described above, there is a possibility that the resist liquid droplets m may flow out from the coating section 24 from just before the rotational coating in the coating section 24 is completed to for a while after the coating cup 32 has been raised. In this case, airflow flows into the vicinity of the application section 24 from the surrounding area, and the application section 24 is
It is preferable to prevent the resist liquid droplets m from reaching other parts. Therefore, in this embodiment, only for the above time,
As shown in FIG. 7, among the holes 27, A, D, and E.

Only F and ■ are opened so that the airflow is directed from the periphery of the application section 24 during that time.

The reason why A and 1 are opened at this time is to ensure that airflow always flows around the cassettes 22 and 26.

According to this embodiment, it is possible to prevent the resist liquid splashes m from contaminating the wafer 29 in other parts.

The dimensions of each part shown in each of the above embodiments are merely examples, and the present invention is not limited to these dimensions.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above in detail, according to the present invention, a plurality of holes that can be opened/closed or whose opening degree can be adjusted are provided in the partitioning means such as a cover or a perch. Since the airflow is adjusted, the eddy area of the airflow around the device can be reduced, and the dust generated from the device can be quickly discharged to the outside without staying inside. Furthermore, the internal airflow can be dynamically and appropriately controlled according to the operating state of the device, and the cleanliness of the interior can be reliably maintained.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view showing the first embodiment of the present invention, FIGS. 2 and 3 are front views showing the hole in FIG. 1, FIG. 4 is a sectional view of FIG. 2, and FIG. 6 is a front view showing the second embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 6 is a plan view showing the perforated plate shown in FIG. 4, and FIG.
8 is a front view showing the third embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 9 is a side view of FIG. 8, FIG. 10 is a sectional view showing the application section of FIG. 8, and FIG. 1 and 12 are transparent perspective views showing a conventional high cleanliness chamber, respectively, and FIGS. 13 and 14 are front views showing airflow in the conventional example shown in FIGS. 11 and 12, respectively. 1... Manufacturing device, 2... Cover (partition means), 5...
... Clean room, 9... Perchage (partition means), 13.18.27... Hole. -Nη pusatsum q-N 4σ, lN ('J to 4 C'J N Nc''-笥0-
Mimiken Semi

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a high clean room where a manufacturing device installed in a clean room is partitioned by a partition means, and highly clean air is introduced into the interior, a plurality of holes are formed in the partition means to communicate the inside and outside. The high cleanliness chamber is further provided with a control means for opening and closing at least one of the holes.