March Instruments, Inc.

David E Hoffman

Louis A Rigali

William F Smith, Iii

Methods and apparatus for plasma treatment of workpieces in which the apparatus includes a reaction chamber having a door through which a magazine loaded with workpieces and an empty magazine can be manually or robotically placed on a shelf in the reaction chamber, and associated apparatus for striking and maintaining a plasma in the reaction chamber, the shelf being provided with stops for maintaining both magazines in alignment so that the workpieces can be pushed out of the loaded magazine, across a gap between the magazines, and into the empty magazine while plasma exists in the gap, and pushing apparatus for pushing workpieces from the loaded magazine, across the gap, and into the empty magazine, and the method of plasma treatment carried out by this apparatus. In one version the pushing apparatus pushes all of the workpieces from magazine to magazine at once. In another version, a subplurality of the workpieces in the loaded magazine is pushed across the gap and into the empty magazine at one time.

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Concord, CA, United States of America

David E Hoffman