Vacuum pumping

Abstract

A vacuum pumping apparatus may include: a common pumping line having a plurality of pumping line inlets and a pumping line outlet, each pumping line inlet being configured to couple with an outlet of an associated plurality of vacuum processing chambers; at least one primary vacuum pump in fluid communication with the pumping line outlet to pump gas from each vacuum processing chamber; and control logic operable to control operation of the primary vacuum pump in response to an indication of an operating state of the plurality of vacuum processing chambers. In this way, the performance of the primary vacuum pump can be adjusted to match the load provided by the processing chambers and when there is an excess capacity, the performance of the primary vacuum pumps can be reduced, which can lead to significant energy savings and reduce wear on the pump.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.