Reactor chamber
View Patent ↗A semiconductor processing chamber having an upper wall, a lower wall, and two side walls. The upper and lower walls each comprise two thin, flat plates that are slightly out of parallel so that the wall has a pitch. The pitches point away from the interior chamber space to enable the chamber to withstand reduced pressures.
1. A reaction chamber, comprising:
a chamber upper wall and a chamber lower wall made of a transparent material which is heat resistant and non-reactive with gases introduced into said chamber;
wherein said chamber upper wall and said chamber lower wall each comprise two, flat rectangular segments that are slightly out of parallel such that each of said chamber upper wall and said chamber lower wall has a pitch, wherein both an inner surface and an outer surface of each wall have a pitch that points in the same direction as the pitch of the wall, and wherein the pitches of the upper and lower walls point away from each other.
2. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , further comprising an inlet flange secured at a forward end of said chamber to said upper and lower walls, and an outlet flange secured at a rearward end of said chamber to said upper and lower walls.
3. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein said pitches of said walls comprise a bend in each of said chamber upper wall and said chamber lower.
4. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein said pitches of said walls comprise a joint between two rectangular segments.
5. The reaction chamber of claim 4 , wherein said joint comprises a welded connection which joins said two rectangular segments.
6. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein each of said upper and lower chamber walls has a thickness ranging between about 4 and about 6 millimeters.
7. The reaction chamber of claim 6 , wherein said thickness is about 5 millimeters.
8. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein said pitch of said walls is at least about 13 millimeters.
9. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein said pitch of said walls is at least about 6% of the width of said chamber.
10. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein the rectangular segments slope at an angle of less than about 10° with respect to horizontal.
11. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein the rectangular segments slope at an angle of about 7° with respect to horizontal.
12. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein the rectangular segments slope at an angle with respect to horizontal such that the segments form an interior angle which is slightly less than 180°.
13. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , wherein the chamber width is about 3 times the chamber height.
14. The reaction chamber of claim 1 , further comprising:
a substrate support provided within said chamber, said substrate support having a central axis around which said substrate support rotates; and
at least one heat source provided outside of said chamber, said heat source being positioned either above or below said chamber.