Ebara Corporation

Nissan Motor Company Limited

Ikutaro Noji

Hozumi Yasuda

Tetsuji Togawa

Osamu Nabeya

Nobuyuki Takada

Shunichiro Kojima

Makoto Fukushima

Keisuke Namiki

Kunihiko Sakurai

Hideki Takayanagi

Makoto Fukubayashi

Itsuki Kobata

Nobuyuki Kawai

Kazuto Hirokawa

Takeshi Iizumi

Masashi Arai

Keno Kato

Hiroyuki Suzuki

Masaki Kato

Takayuki Saito

Mitsuhiko Shirakashi

Kaori Yoshida

Yasushi Toma

Kazuya Takahashi

Tsukuru Suzuki

Kazuhiro Ishigami

Masayuki Kumekawa

Naoki Nakada

Masaki Kaiju

Shozo Nakayama

Koetsu Takehana

Ikuo Kinami

The present invention relates to a substrate holding apparatus for holding and pressing a substrate against a polishing surface. The substrate holding apparatus includes a top ring body for holding the substrate, an elastic pad for contacting the substrate, and a support member for supporting the elastic pad. The substrate holding apparatus further includes a contact member mounted on a lower surface of the support member and disposed in a space formed by the elastic pad and the support member. The contact member has an elastic membrane for contacting the elastic pad. A first pressure chamber is defined in the contact member, and a second pressure chamber is defined outside of the contact member. The substrate holding apparatus also includes a fluid source for independently supplying a fluid into, or creating a vacuum in, the first pressure chamber and the second pressure chamber.

Substrate holding apparatus

An electrolytic processing apparatus can detect the end point of electrolytic processing stably with high precision and with a relatively simple construction. The electrolytic processing apparatus includes: a processing electrode which can come close to or into contact with a processing object; a feeding electrode for feeding electricity to the processing object; a fluid supply section for supplying fluid between the processing object and at least one of the processing electrode and the feeding electrode; a processing power source for applying a voltage between the processing electrode and the feeding electrode; a drive section for causing relative movement between the processing object and at least one of the processing electrode and the feeding electrode; and an eddy current sensor for detecting the thickness of the processing object from a change in eddy current loss. The sensor is disposed not in contact with (or separately) by an insulator from the processing electrode and/or the feeding electrode.

Electrolytic processing method

The present invention replaces all or a portion of substrate processing by chemical-mechanical polishing with electrolytic processing using deionized water, ultrapure water or the like. An electrolytic processing apparatus comprises: a chemical-mechanical polishing section for chemically-mechanically polishing a surface of a substrate; an electrolytic processing section having a processing electrode and a feeding electrode, and also having an ion exchanger provided at least either between the substrate and the processing electrode or between the substrate and the feeding electrode, for electrolytically processing a surface of a workpiece under existence of a solution by applying a voltage between the processing electrode and the feeding electrode; and a top ring capable of freely moving between the chemical-mechanical polishing section and the processing electrode section.

Electrolytic processing apparatus and substrate processing apparatus and method

A composite processing apparatus which can securely process a conductive material, such as a copper film, at a low surface pressure and a high rate while effectively preventing the formation of pits is disclosed. The composite processing apparatus includes: a substrate holder for holding a substrate; a processing table including a mechanical processing section for processing a surface of the substrate by a processing method involving a mechanical action; and an electrolytic processing section which is separate from the mechanical processing section. The electrolytic processing section includes a processing electrode with an ion exchanger, for processing the substrate by applying a voltage between the processing electrode and the substrate while keeping the ion exchanger () in contact with the substrate. The composite processing apparatus also includes a liquid supply section for supplying a liquid between the substrate and the processing electrode, and between the substrate and the mechanical processing section; and a drive section for moving the substrate and the processing table relative to each other.

Composite processing apparatus and method

There are provided an electrolytic processing apparatus and an electrolytic processing method which can regenerate an ion exchanger with an enhanced regeneration rate of ion-exchange capacity without adversely affecting the throughput of the apparatus. The electrolytic processing apparatus includes: a holder for holding a workpiece; an electrode section including an electrode, a contact member, and a discharge portion for discharging metal ions which have been taken from the workpiece into the contact member during processing, said electrode section coming close to or into contact with the workpiece held by the holder to effect processing of the workpiece in the presence of a liquid; and a regeneration dummy electrode which can come close to or into contact with the contact member.

Electrolytic processing apparatus and electrolytic processing method

There is provided a substrate polishing machine which comprises a polishing surface and a substrate carrier for holding a substrate and bringing it into contact with the polishing surface. The substrate carrier comprises a carrier body, a substrate holding member for holding a substrate with a surface of the substrate to be polished being directed towards the polishing surface. The substrate holding member is mounted on the carrier body in such a manner that the substrate holding member is movable both towards and away from the polishing surface. The substrate polishing machine further comprises a substrate holding member positioning device provided on a side of the substrate holding member opposite to that used for holding the substrate. The substrate holding member positioning device has a flexible member which defines a chamber, and which, upon introduction of a non-compressible fluid, is expanded in a direction towards the polishing surface.

Substrate polishing machine

The present invention relates to a substrate holding apparatus for holding a substrate to be polished and pressing the substrate against a polishing surface. The substrate holding apparatus comprises a top ring body for holding a substrate, an elastic pad for being brought into contact with the substrate, and a support member for supporting the elastic pad. The substrate holding apparatus further comprises a contact member mounted on a lower surface of the support member and disposed in a space formed by the elastic pad and the support member. The contact member has an elastic membrane for being brought into contact with the elastic pad. A first pressure chamber is defined in the contact member, and a second pressure chamber is defined outside of the contact member. The substrate holding apparatus further comprises a fluid source for independently supplying a fluid into, or creating a vacuum in, the first pressure chamber and the second pressure chamber.

A dressing apparatus dresses a polishing surface of a polishing table used for polishing a workpiece such as a semiconductor wafer in a polishing apparatus. The dressing apparatus comprises a dresser body () connected to a dresser drive shaft () which is vertically movable, a dresser plate () which is vertically movable with respect to the dresser body (), and a dressing member () held by the dresser plate () for dressing the polishing surface ().

Dressing apparatus and polishing apparatus

A control system for an automotive air conditioner has an ambient air temperature sensor; a solar radiation quantity sensor; a passenger room temperature sensor; a cooled air temperature sensor; an air-mix door open degree sensor; and a bypass door open degree sensor. The control system further has a first device which, based on information from the ambient air temperature sensor and the solar radiation quantity sensor, derives a first target temperature of air drawn out from an air outlet structure; a second device which, based on the information from the cooled air temperature sensor and the air-mix door open degree sensor, derives a second target temperature of air drawn out from a foot area air duct; and a third device which, based on the information from the cooled air temperature sensor, the first target temperature and the second target temperature, derives a ratio between the amount of air flowing in a bypass passage and that of air blown out from the air outlet structure; and a fourth device which controls the open degree of the bypass door in accordance with the derived ratio.

Automotive air conditioning device

An air conditioner system for a vehicle having an occupant compartment which includes a driver's occupying area and a front passenger's occupying area. The system includes a vent duct adapted to conduct a conditioned air. The vent duct defines a first passages opening to the driver's occupying area and a second passage opening to the front passenger's occupying area. First and second vent valves are disposed within the first and second passages, respectively. First and second actuators are drivingly connected to the first and second vent valves. A first sensor is so constructed and arranged as to detect insolation magnitude within the driver's occupying area and generate a first sensor signal indicative of the detected insolation magnitude within the driver's occupying area. A second sensor is so constructed and arranged as to detect insolation magnitude within the front passenger's occupying area and generate a second sensor signal indicative of said detected insolation magnitude within the front passenger's occupying area. A control unit is provided to determine target degrees of opening which the first and second vent valves are to take in response to the first and second sensor signals and providing first and second outputs to the first and second actuators, respectively, to set the first and second vent valves at the determined target degrees of opening.

Air conditioner system for vehicle

An air conditioning apparatus for an automotive vehicle comprises: a compressor (101) driven by an engine (101) for compressing a refrigerant; an evaporator (103) for evaporating the refrigerant compressed by the compressor; engine speed commanding section (104) for outputting a first command signal to drive the engine at a first engine idle speed when the compressor is not actuated and outputting a second command signal to drive the engine at a second engine idle speed higher than the first engine idle speed when the compressor is actuated; an after-evaporator temperature sensor (105) for detecting air temperature Immediately after the evaporator; an external air temperature sensor (106) for detecting external air temperature; and an inhibiting section (107) for inhibiting the engine speed commanding section from outputting the second command signal, when after-evaporator temperature is lower than a predetermined temperature and further external air temperature is lower than another predetermined temperature, irrespective of whether the compressor is actuated or not. The air conditioning apparatus can control engine idle speed without use of any timer and without deteriorating fuel consumption rate.

Air conditioning apparatus for automotive vehicle

In an engine idle speed control system associated with an air conditioner provided with an evaporator for evaporating a refrigerant compressed by a compressor actuated or deactuated by an engine near an evaporator freeze limit temperature, the engine idle speed is increased under consideration of thermal load applied to the compressor whenever the compressor is being actuated. The compressor 21 is deactuated when the temperature of air having passed through the evaporator 22 drops below a predetermined value, and actuated when the same temperature rises beyond another higher predetermined value. Whenever the compressor 21 has been deactuated, the time interval between the deactuation and the actuation of the compressor is measured. If the measured time interval is relatively short, since this indicates a relatively high thermal load applied to the compressor, the engine idle speed is increased. However, if the measured time interval is relatively long, since this indicates a relatively low thermal load, the engine idle speed is not increased, thus improving the fuel consumption rate and the compressor durability without frequently actuating and deactuating the compressor.

Engine idle speed control system for automotive vehicle

An automatic air conditioner for a vehicle comprising a cooling unit, heater and a blower fan which are controlled by a control circuit. The air conditioner is arranged to adjust a compartment temperature to a target value set by a target value setting means. Furthermore, the air conditioner has functions such as a quick cooling, a quick heating and a low water-temperature drive control to quickly adjust the compartment temperature to the target value. The air conditioner further includes a function wherein the change of the preset target value is forbidden in operation of the quick cooling, the quick heating and the low water-temperature drive controls to prevent the compartment from being over-cooled or over-heated by the change of the target value in the operation.

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Yokohama, Japan

Ikutaro Noji