Detecting plasma chamber malfunction
AssigneeApplied Materials, Inc.
InventorsBeom Soo Park, Hong Soon Kim, Soo Young Choi, James Hoffman, Suhail Anwar, John M. White
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Malfunction of a component within an RF-powered plasma chamber is detected by observing an operating condition of the plasma chamber and detecting when the operating condition deviates from a previously observed range bounded by lower and upper limits. The lower and upper limits are determined by observing the minimum and maximum values of that operating condition during the processing of workpieces throughout one or more plasma chamber cleaning cycles immediately preceding the most recent cleaning of the plasma chamber.
Claims10
A method of detecting malfunction of an RF-powered plasma chamber, comprising repeatedly performing the steps of:
- plasma processing a set of one or more workpieces within the plasma chamber;
- observing the minimum value and the maximum value of an operating condition of the plasma chamber during the plasma processing of said set;
- establishing the value of a lower limit as equal to said minimum value minus a first non-negative offset value, and establishing the value of an upper limit as equal to said maximum value plus a second non-negative offset value;
- after the step of plasma processing said set, cleaning one or more components of the plasma chamber;
- subsequently plasma processing a subsequent set of one or more workpieces within the plasma chamber;
- and
- for each respective workpiece in said subsequent set, performing the steps of:
- (i) after plasma processing of that respective workpiece begins, observing the present value of said operating condition of the plasma chamber;
- (ii) comparing said present value to the values established in the establishing step for the lower limit and upper limit;
- and
- (iii) signaling an alert if said present value is less than the lower limit or greater than the upper limit.
A method of detecting malfunction of an RF-powered plasma chamber, comprising repeatedly performing the steps of:
- performing first and second plasma processes on each successive workpiece in a set of one or more workpieces;
- observing the minimum value and the maximum value of a first operating condition of the plasma chamber during said performing of the first plasma process on the workpieces of said set;
- establishing the value of a lower limit as equal to said minimum value minus a first non-negative offset value, and establishing the value of an upper limit as equal to said maximum value plus a second non-negative offset value;
- after performing said first and second plasma processes on each successive workpiece in said set, cleaning one or more components of the plasma chamber;
- subsequently performing said first and second plasma processes on a subsequent set of one or more workpieces within the plasma chamber;
- and
- for each respective workpiece in said subsequent set, performing the steps of:
- (i) after the performing of the first plasma process on that respective workpiece begins, observing the present value of said first operating condition of the plasma chamber;
- (ii) comparing said present value to the values established in the establishing step for the lower limit and upper limit;
- and
- (iii) signaling an alert if said present value is less than the lower limit or greater than the upper limit.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.