Wiring-free, plumbing-free, cooled, vacuum chuck

• Main Authors: DUFF DAVID G, ELDERSHAW CRAIG
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 07.06.2011
• Subjects: BASIC ELECTRIC ELEMENTS; BORING; CLIMATE CHANGE MITIGATION TECHNOLOGIES IN THE PRODUCTION ORPROCESSING OF GOODS; ELECTRIC SOLID STATE DEVICES NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR; ELECTRICITY; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; HAND TOOLS; MACHINE TOOLS; MANIPULATORS; METAL-WORKING NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR; PERFORMING OPERATIONS; PORTABLE POWER-DRIVEN TOOLS; REDUCTION OF GREENHOUSE GAS [GHG] EMISSIONS, RELATED TO ENERGYGENERATION, TRANSMISSION OR DISTRIBUTION; SEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER US CLASSIFICATION; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS; TECHNOLOGIES OR APPLICATIONS FOR MITIGATION OR ADAPTATION AGAINSTCLIMATE CHANGE; TOOLS OR BENCH DEVICES NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR, FORFASTENING, CONNECTING, DISENGAGING OR HOLDING; TRANSPORTING; TURNING

A solar cell production system utilizes self-contained vacuum chucks that hold and cool solar cell wafers during transport on a conveyor between processing stations during a fabrication process. Each self-contained vacuum chuck includes its own local vacuum pump and a closed-loop cooling system. After each wafer is processed, it is removed from its vacuum chuck, and the vacuum chuck is returned to the start of the production line by a second conveyor belt. In one embodiment, each vacuum chuck includes an inductive power supply that is inductively coupled to an external source to drive that vacuum chuck's vacuum pump and cooling system. An optional battery is recharged by the inductive power supply, and is used to power the vacuum pump and cooling system during hand-off between adjacent processing stations.