Substrate Treating Apparatus with Reordering Interface
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional substrate treating apparatuses with single main transport mechanisms limit throughput and face challenges in maintaining the order of substrates during parallel treatment processes, leading to difficulties in controlling and tracking the treatment history of each substrate.
Innovation Solution
A substrate treating apparatus with a treating section featuring multiple substrate treatment lines that operate in parallel, an interface section with a buffer unit, and a transport mechanism that adjusts the order of substrates to ensure they are transported to the exposing machine in the same order as they were loaded, maintaining efficient processing and independent operation of each treatment line.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If multiple substrate treatment lines operate in parallel, then throughput is improved, but substrate order control becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
A buffer unit is introduced as an intermediary between the parallel treatment lines and the exposing machine. This buffer temporarily stores substrates and allows the system to reorder them before final transport, decoupling the parallel processing from the sequential output requirement and enabling both high throughput and reliable order control.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary ordering operations by storing substrates in the buffer unit in advance of their final destination. This allows substrates to be arranged in the correct sequence before being transported to the exposing machine, ensuring proper order control even when multiple treatment lines operate simultaneously.
2Productivity
If multiple substrate treatment lines operate in parallel, then processing efficiency increases, but tracking treatment history becomes complex
Solution Approach 1:
The control unit implements a feedback system that tracks each substrate's movement through the parallel treatment lines and its position in the buffer unit. This feedback mechanism maintains accurate treatment history information despite the complexity of multiple concurrent processing paths, allowing reliable tracking and control.
3Device complexity
If a single main transport mechanism is used, then device complexity is reduced, but throughput is limited
Solution Approach 1:
The transport system is segmented into multiple independent treatment lines, each with its own transport capability. This segmentation allows parallel processing of substrates through different lines, significantly increasing throughput while keeping each individual line relatively simple in structure.
Data Source
AI summary
A treating section has substrate treatment lines arranged one over the other for treating substrates while transporting the substrates substantially horizontally. An IF section transports the substrates fed from each substrate treatment line to an exposing machine provided separately from this apparatus. The substrates are transported to the exposing machine in the order in which the substrates are loaded into the treating section. The throughput of this apparatus can be improved greatly, without increasing the footprint, since the substrate treatment lines are arranged one over the other. Each substrate can be controlled easily since the order of the substrates transported to the exposing machine is in agreement with the order of the substrates loaded into the treating section.