Wafer Sorting Conveyors With Selective Deceleration at Branch-Offs
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing wafer sorting systems face challenges in maintaining high throughput without damaging thin wafers, as increased transport speed leads to wafer crashes and jamming issues, especially when transferring between main and branching-off conveyors.
Innovation Solution
A wafer sorting apparatus with decelerating conveyors that selectively decrease speed only for wafers designated to branch off, allowing constant or increasing speed for others, and featuring independent control of decelerating conveyors associated with each branch-off, along with accelerating conveyors to compensate for deceleration time, and shifting mechanisms to facilitate smooth transfer.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If transport speed is increased to enhance throughput, then productivity is improved, but wafers crash against stoppers and are damaged
Solution Approach 1:
The decelerating conveyor is divided into multiple sections (first section upstream of branching-off conveyor, second section between conveying belts, third section downstream) that can be independently controlled. This segmentation allows different parts of the conveyor to operate at different speeds, enabling smooth deceleration of wafers before transfer while maintaining high speed in other sections to preserve throughput.
Solution Approach 2:
The conveyor speeds are made dynamically adjustable rather than fixed. The control device can selectively decrease the speed of decelerating conveyor sections only when wafers are designated to leave at a particular branch-off, while maintaining constant or increasing speed for wafers passing through. This dynamic control prevents wafer damage while preserving overall system productivity.
2Ease of operation
If wafers are stopped at branch-off positions for transfer, then sorting is enabled, but continuous material flow is interrupted and throughput is impaired
Solution Approach 1:
The system uses dynamic speed control where the decelerating conveyor sections are only activated when wafers are designated to leave at a particular branch-off. For wafers that continue along the main transport path, the conveyor maintains constant or increasing speed, ensuring continuous material flow and preserving throughput while enabling sorting when needed.
Solution Approach 2:
Different sections of the conveyor system have different speed characteristics tailored to local requirements. The decelerating conveyor sections provide controlled deceleration only at specific branch-off points where sorting is required, while other sections maintain high speed for continuous transport, optimizing both sorting capability and throughput locally.
3Adaptability or versatility
If decelerating conveyor sections are controlled independently for each branch-off, then selective sorting is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The control device is designed as a universal controller that manages multiple decelerating conveyor sections and branching-off conveyors through a single integrated system. This multi-functional control approach enables selective sorting at multiple branch-off points while avoiding the complexity of multiple independent control systems, as the same control device coordinates all sorting operations.
Data Source
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AI summary
The invention relates to a wafer sorting apparatus (100) having a wafer transport device (10) which comprises - a main transport path (1) comprising at least one branch-off (2), - at least one branching-off transport path (3, 4) extending from the at least one branch-off (2) and - a control device (8) for controlling the transport of wafers, characterized in that the at least one branch-off (2) comprises a decelerating conveyor (12) forming a section of the main transport path (1) and being in communication with the control device (8), wherein the control device (8) is configured to selectively decelerate a wafer approaching said branch-off (2) by decreasing the speed of the decelerating conveyor (12).