Methods of Continuously Wet Etching A Patterned Substrate

A method of patterning a substrate comprising:

• providing a substrate comprising a continuous web having a metalized surface having an etch resist patterned region and an unpatterned region;
• passing the substrate web through a reaction vessel, wherein the reaction vessel comprises an etchant bath comprising an oxidizing agent and a metal complexing agent;
• wet etching the substrate web within the reaction vessel by contacting the metalized surface with the oxidizing and metal complexing agents to remove metal from the unpatterned region;
• after wet etching the substrate:
• (i) rinsing the wet etched substrate with a first rinse of water;
• (ii)
• collecting the rinse;
• (iii) recycling at least a portion of the collected rinse to the etchant bath;
• maintaining the concentrations of the oxidizing and metal complexing agents in the etchant bath by delivering a replenishment feed of each of the oxidizing and metal complexing agents to the etchant bath at a first replenishment feed rate and a second replenishment feed rate, respectively;
• and
• maintaining the concentration of the metal in the etchant bath by discharging an amount of the etchant bath from the reaction vessel at an etchant bath removal rate;
• wherein the first and second replenishment feed rates and the etchant bath removal rate are determined based at least in part on a rate that metal etched from the substrate enters the etchant bath.