The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Aug. 23, 2005
Filed:
Jul. 03, 2002
Kung Chris Wu, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Kung Chris Wu, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Other;
Abstract
A prealigner for aligning a disk-like work piece such as a silicon wafer, by centering and rotationally orienting the work piece. The prealigner centers and orients the work piece while only touching the periphery of the work piece using a plurality of wafer rollers and an air bearing table to support the weight of the wafer. The prealigner can accept a range of different diameters of work piece without modification because the wafer rollers are radially moveable until they contact and center the work piece. The prealigner includes a plurality of simple optical sensors for detecting a notch in the work piece and the work piece is rotationally oriented based on a notch detection signal from the optical sensors.