Stepper 1 (GCA 6300) - Standard Operating Procedure

Work In Progress This article is still under construction. It may contain factual errors. Content is subject to change.

Cleaning the back-side of wafer

If the back side of wafer has some resist residue or particulates, this can cause errors in the interpreted best focus point since the wafer surface may be at a different height.

1. Make sure all work surfaces/spin chucks/hot plates are cleaned! Don’t use wipes, instead use cleaned steel surfaces.
2. Spin coat resist following the recipe for spinning/baking specific resist.
3. Check back-side of wafer thoroughly for resist residue/particulates before loading into system!
4. If you see particulates, try to blow off with high N2 flow first, you may need a razor blade to remove stubborn particles.
5. If you see resist residue, do next:
   1. Place wafer upside down in POLOS spinner using non-contact chuck.
   2. Set spin speed to 2000rpm.
   3. Spin wafer, wait until at top speed.
   4. Squirt Acetone on sample back for 3 seconds. Followed by ISO for 3 sec.
   5. Spin Dry while blowing with N2.
6. Load the wafer on chuck and then stage.

Reticle Loading and Unloading

The alignment of the reticle (mask) to the system is critical for achieving reproducible alignment.  System alignment marks on the reticle are located near the right and left edges of the mask and are 103 mm apart so they do not get exposed within the 100 mm exposure area of the mask.  These marks are put on automatically by Photronix and the gds file can be obtained from Brian Thibeault if you use a different vendor. Use the following procedure to align the mask correctly to the system.

Loading the reticle:

1. Unlock spindle and swing lamp column to middle position so that the lens is exposed.
2. Place mask chrome side down so that wording appears correct ( as seen in L-edit file).
3. Swing lamp column so that objective can be used to align mask, DO NOT tighten spindle lock at this time.
4. Using your hands and looking through microscope, shift and rotate mask so that the “crosses” are roughly aligned
5. Tighten spindle lock. This releases a vacuum holder onto the top of the mask so that the mask may be precisely aligned.
6. Looking through microscope, use alignment knobs (x,y) to translate and rotate(Θ) the mask into position.  First focus the objective by using the knob on top of the microscope.  Use the right alignment mark for the x-axis alignment and both alignment marks for the y-axis and rotation alignments.  NOTE: To get best and fastest results approach alignment from one direction, do not try to wiggle back and forth about the alignment position. Backlash in the mechanics can make this frustrating. You should see equal amounts of light in between all lines when the mask is aligned well (within 0.1 um).
7. Once mask is aligned, pull the reticle vacuum button to the left of the lens column. The reticle is now vacuumed to the system.
8. Use the stencil (usually L-shape mask cover), to cover part of the mask plate that you do NOT want to be exposed. If you have just one layer on your mask plate, you do not need to use the stencil. There are also blade apertures that could be used. The knobs on the lamp column  (X,Y) can be adjusted to 100,75,50 and 25% to be open. Fully open blade apertures would be at 100%
9. You are now ready to proceed with a focus job, map job, or exposure job.
10. This part is important: If alignments are critical, do not just brush through this procedure.  The global alignment requires good, precise alignment of the reticle with the system in order to work correctly.  The local alignment system can adjust for local X and Y misalignment, but not rotational errors.

Unloading the reticle:

1. Unlock spindle and swing lamp column to middle position so that the lens is exposed.
2. Pull the reticle vacuum button to the left of the lens column. Unload the reticle from the system.
3. Swing the lamp column back. Tighten spindle lock.

Wafer Loading

1)   Attach the appropriate chuck to the system. ( Link: How to select proper chuck)

2)   Place your wafer centered on the chuck, noting the orientation. If you are doing an alignment step, make sure to place the wafer in the same orientation and as best as possible in the same location as the first exposure.  The set screws in the chuck can help to get reproducible placement of the wafer.  When the wafer is in place, flip the right vacuum switch upwards to hold the sample.

3)   Place the sample chuck onto the stage, again trying to be repeatable, and flip the left vacuum switch upwards to hold the chuck.

4)   Now you are ready to do an exposure.

Running a Job – Normal operation

• 1. Batch Control
     1. Task Streaming
        1. Wait until wafers are read by machine
        2. Ensure all other job's status is "Completed" or "Aborted".
        3. Task: Append Batch (or select a previous batch and copy)
        4. Enter Batch ID first, Hit Return to apply change
        5. Press Select Button under Job Name and navigate to your job
        6. Click on Layer ID to get a list of layers you can expose: Select layer you want to shoot.
        7. Enter number of wafers in Batch Size
        8. Batch Type is P for production run (see below for doing a FEM)
        9. Verify Energy, Focus Offset, Ilumination Mode, NA, Sigma and change as desired
           1. Click through the Images to be shot by this Layer and verify for each Image.
           2. Click through the Images to be shot by this Layer, and make sure all the "Reticle ID" shown are loaded into the Reticle system. (Toggle the "View" button on the System View to see loaded Reticle ID's.)
        10. Hit Action: Apply button to register all changes
        11. Press Accept Button at Top
        12. Press Continue Button to execute batch. (May be a short delay before this becomes active.)
        13. If batch has general failure:  Choose the (clear litho cluster) option.