KR20130113303A - Vapor deposition apparatus and vapor deposition source - Google Patents

Abstract

In the vacuum vapor deposition apparatus, the vapor deposition source which suppressed the film of the inclined surface which arises when forming a vapor deposition film is implement | achieved.
In the vacuum vapor deposition apparatus 100, the vapor deposition film of a predetermined pattern is formed on the board | substrate 1 through the mask 2. The evaporation source 3 is arranged opposite to the substrate. The evaporation source has a crucible 3b and a plurality of injection nozzles 33 for guiding the evaporation material 3c housed in the crucible onto a substrate. The spray nozzles are arranged in a row. The upper diffusion prevention plate 31 and the lower diffusion prevention plate 32 are arranged on both sides of the injection nozzle row, and the horizontal diffusion prevention plate 34 is disposed between each injection nozzle. The evaporation source is moved up and down by the moving means 4.

Description

Vacuum deposition apparatus and its deposition source {VAPOR DEPOSITION APPARATUS AND VAPOR DEPOSITION SOURCE}

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a vacuum deposition apparatus and a deposition source thereof, and more particularly, to a vacuum deposition apparatus and a deposition source suitable for forming an organic EL film or the like through a mask on a substrate.

Patent Document 1 describes an example of a conventional film forming apparatus. In the film-forming apparatus of this patent document 1, a vapor deposition source and a board | substrate are arrange | positioned at intervals in a vacuum apparatus. On the vapor deposition source side front surface of a board | substrate, the mask is arrange | positioned in close contact with a board | substrate. And in the film-forming apparatus of this patent document 1, the light emitting material which is a vapor deposition material is sprayed toward the board | substrate surface from the nozzle which an evaporation source has. At this time, the arrangement direction of the some injection nozzle of the evaporation source is made into the horizontal direction, and the board | substrate is hold | maintained vertically and opposes the injection nozzle. By moving the spray nozzle in the vertical direction, the entire surface of the substrate is vacuum deposited.

[Patent Document 1] Japanese Patent Publication No. 2010-86956

In the film-forming apparatus of the said patent document 1, the evaporation source is heat-controlled and the light emitting material is injected from the some injection nozzle arrange | positioned on the line. And the evaporation source drive means has the vertical drive means which moves the evaporation source which has the nozzle arrange | positioned in line shape up and down so that the whole surface of a board | substrate may be deposited.

By the way, when forming an organic EL film etc., it becomes important how faithfully a vapor deposition film is formed in the hole of the mask arrange | positioned at the front surface of a board | substrate. Although the mask and the substrate are in close contact with each other, very small gaps may be formed, and the spray nozzles of the substrate surface and the vapor deposition source do not face each other at all positions on the substrate surface. As a result, the injection nozzle is inevitably a discrete arrangement rather than a distributed arrangement, so that a part inclined with respect to the injection nozzle is also slightly generated. Therefore, the upper and lower heat shielding plates employed in the conventional evaporation source can regulate the diffusion of the deposition film in the vertical direction, but the diffusion in the left and right directions cannot be sufficiently regulated.

Therefore, when the substrate surface after vacuum deposition is observed, a film having a substantially uniform thickness is formed through the hole formed in the mask, while a very thin inclined plane film is formed around the hole as compared with the film thickness formed in the hole portion. It is. The width | variety of this inclined surface shape film is about tens of micrometers at maximum.

Background Art In recent years, in substrates used in OLEDs and the like, which require high definition, the distance between the openings of the mask, that is, the distance between the pixels of the vapor deposition film to be formed continues to narrow, and this inclined film has become a problem. . In the case of the above-described OLED, since the light emission of each color (R, G, B) is suppressed by the current, there exists a possibility that two or three colors may be emitted simultaneously and will be mixed by the presence of a slope-shaped film | membrane. In addition, when controlling the current to emit light of each color, there is a fear that the inclined surface portion of the film is brightly emitted, resulting in uneven luminance. In the worst case, the luminance is lowered and a short circuit between pixels occurs. In the said patent document 1, it is not fully considered about avoiding the influence by this inclined surface film | membrane.

This invention is made | formed in view of the said trouble of the said prior art, The objective is to implement | achieve the vapor deposition source which suppressed the film of the inclined surface which arises when forming a vapor deposition film in a vacuum vapor deposition apparatus. Another object of the present invention is to realize a vapor deposition source for suppressing an inclined plane film and obtaining a highly precise substrate.

A feature of the present invention for achieving the above object is a vacuum deposition apparatus for heating and depositing an evaporation material stored in an evaporation source to form a deposition pattern of a predetermined pattern through a mask on a substrate, wherein the evaporation source is a crucible, and It has a plurality of injection nozzles for guiding the evaporation material stored in the crucible to the substrate, the injection nozzles are arranged in a line, between the first diffusion preventing plate disposed on both sides of the injection nozzle row and each injection nozzle And a second diffusion barrier plate and a moving means for moving the evaporation source.

And in this aspect, the injection nozzle row is extended in the horizontal direction, it is preferable that the moving device to move the evaporation source in the vertical direction.

Another feature of the present invention for achieving the above object is to use in a vacuum deposition apparatus for forming a deposition pattern of a predetermined pattern on a substrate through a mask, in the evaporation source containing the deposition material, the crucible and the evaporation housed in the crucible And a plurality of spray nozzles for guiding the substance to the substrate, the spray nozzles being arranged in a row, the first diffusion preventing plate disposed on both sides of the spray nozzle row, and the second diffusion nozzle disposed between each spray nozzle. It is provided with the prevention plate. In this aspect, the pitch between the nozzles in the nozzle row may be a wide pitch at the center portion, narrow at both ends, or may be equal pitch.

According to the present invention, in a vacuum deposition apparatus having a deposition source in which a plurality of nozzles are arranged in a line, in addition to the arrangement direction of the nozzles, a means for suppressing diffusion of the deposition material between the nozzles is provided. The vapor deposition source which suppressed the film | membrane of inclined surface shape to be implemented can be implement | achieved. Moreover, the board | substrate which suppressed the film of the inclined surface shape and made high precision is obtained.

1 is a front view and a sectional view of an embodiment of a vacuum deposition source according to the present invention.
FIG. 2 is a partial perspective view of the vacuum deposition source shown in FIG. 1. FIG.
3 is a view for explaining an inclined plane film generated during vacuum deposition.
4 is a schematic view of one embodiment of a vacuum vapor deposition apparatus according to the present invention.

EMBODIMENT OF THE INVENTION Hereinafter, one Example of the vacuum deposition apparatus which concerns on this invention is described using drawing. The vacuum vapor deposition apparatus 100 is typically shown in FIG. In the vacuum chamber 9, the substrate 1 is held substantially vertically by the substrate holding means 7. In the sixth generation, the size of the substrate 1 is about 1500 mm in width and about 1850 mm in length in the longitudinal direction. On the front surface of the substrate 1, a mask 2 is arranged in close contact with the substrate 1. The mask 2 is vertically held by the mask holding means 8. The mask 2 is formed with a plurality of openings described later in detail in accordance with a predetermined pattern. The size of the mask 2 is about 1700-1800 mm in width, and the length in a vertical direction is about 2000 mm.

The vapor deposition source 3 is arrange | positioned facing the assembly of this board | substrate 1 and the mask 2. As shown in FIG. The vapor deposition source 3 is attached to the movement means 4, and is able to move to an up-down direction. The vapor deposition source 3 moves vertically by the electric motor 5 provided in the outer side of the vacuum chamber 9 rotating the moving means 4 connected to this electric motor 5. As the movement means 4, a ball screw, a rail, etc. are used. On the other hand, the vacuum chamber 9 is evacuated by the vacuum evacuation means 6 to the pressure suitable for vapor deposition.

Next, the detail of the vapor deposition source 3 used for the vacuum vapor deposition apparatus 100 comprised in this way is demonstrated using FIG. 1 and FIG. In FIG. 1, the front view (the same figure (a)) of the vapor deposition source 3 and its A-A cross section (FIG. (B)) are shown. In FIG. 2, a part of the vapor deposition source 3 shown in FIG. 1 is taken out, and is shown in perspective view.

The vapor deposition source 3 extends in the horizontal direction to the same length as the width | variety of the board | substrate 1, and has a columnar shape with a short Y and Z direction length compared with the X direction length. The vapor deposition source 3 includes an evaporation unit 35, an injection nozzle 33 attached to the evaporation unit 35, and an enclosing upper diffusion prevention plate 31 provided around the injection nozzle 33, and a lower portion. The diffusion prevention plate 32 and the horizontal diffusion prevention plate 34 are provided.

In the evaporator 35, a crucible 3b in which the vapor deposition material 3c is housed is accommodated in the frame-like housing 3e. The crucible 3b has the rectangular parallelepiped shape extended in the width direction, and the injection nozzle 33 is attached at intervals in the width direction of the front surface side. On the outside of the crucible 3b, a plurality of heaters 3a for heating the crucible 3b are disposed up and down, and are held in the heat insulating housing 3e. The heat radiating means 3d is attached to the front and back sides of the housing 3e, and the injection nozzle 33 is prevented from becoming excessively high temperature.

The upper diffusion prevention plate 31 of the rectangular shape extended in the width direction (X direction) is attached to the upper part of the front surface side of the housing 3e. The length of the front diffusion prevention plate 31 in the front direction (Y direction) is longer than the length of the injection nozzle 33. Similarly, the lower diffusion prevention plate 32 of the rectangular shape extended in the width direction (X direction) is attached to the lower part of the front surface side of the housing 3e. The length in the front direction (Y direction) of the lower diffusion prevention plate 32 is the same as the length of the upper diffusion prevention plate 31 in the same direction.

Here, as a feature of the present invention, the horizontal diffusion prevention plate 34 is vertically provided between the upper diffusion prevention plate 31 and the lower diffusion prevention plate 32. The horizontal diffusion prevention plate 34 partitions each injection nozzle 33, and is necessarily provided between the injection nozzles 33. On the other hand, the pitch in the width direction (X direction) of the injection nozzle 33 may be an equal pitch, or may be an uneven pitch such that the center portion is wider and the pitch becomes narrower toward both ends.

Next, the operation of the vacuum deposition apparatus 100 of the above embodiment will be described with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4. The board | substrate 1 carried in the vacuum vapor deposition apparatus 100 by the conveyance means which is not shown in figure is hold | maintained by the board | substrate holding means 7, and is also hold | maintained in the predetermined position by this also not shown alignment means. As the substrate holding means 7, in consideration of being in a vacuum, electrostatic adsorption or a mechanical mechanical clamp is used.

Next, the mask holding means 8 is used to hold the mask 2 at a position in a predetermined relationship with respect to the substrate 1. The mask 2 is provided in the mask sheet in which the some opening is formed, and the outer peripheral part of this mask sheet, and consists of a frame for attaching the mask 2 to the mask holding means 8. Alignment means (not shown) is positioned so that the alignment mark provided on the substrate 1 coincides with the alignment opening mark provided on the mask 2.

The deposition source 3, which is spaced apart from the mask 2 by a predetermined distance, is moved up and down by moving means 4 such as a ball screw or a rail, and is moved to a predetermined deposition position by a control means (not shown). Position is determined. In the crucible inside the evaporation source 3, a light emitting material as the evaporation material 3c is accommodated, and the evaporation material 3c is heat-controlled to achieve a stable evaporation rate. The heated deposition material 3c is ejected from the plurality of spray nozzles 33 arranged in the deposition source 3, as shown by the arrows in FIG. If necessary, the additives are also heated and deposited at the same time in order to obtain a predetermined characteristic in the deposited film. In this case, the vapor deposition source 3 and the pair or plural vapor deposition sources 3 are arranged in parallel up and down to be deposited.

Small openings are formed in the mask sheet in a plurality of rows in the vertical and horizontal directions by etching or the like. The pitch is three colors (R, G, B) for several hundred micrometers pitch in the horizontal direction, and several tens of micrometers interval is formed in order to keep distance from the line which adjoins up and down in the vertical direction. Due to the formation of the opening by etching or the like, the cross-sectional shape of the opening has a paper shape in which the deposition source 3 side is slightly open.

By the way, when the vapor deposition material 3c is deposited on the board | substrate 1 beyond the mask 2 from the some injection nozzle 33 arrange | positioned in a horizontal line, as shown in FIG. 3, the inclined surface around the vapor deposition film 12 conventionally. A film 13 in shape is formed. Formation of the inclined surface film 13 also means that the film thickness of the vapor deposition film 12 is reduced at the outer circumferential portion, and therefore is not preferable in terms of keeping the film thickness uniform. Moreover, in recent years, since high definition is required also in organic EL film | membrane, it is also unpreferable from the point of mixing with another color. Therefore, even if the inclined surface film 13 cannot be zero, it is required to be within a few micrometers of the periphery of the opening. In addition, the thickness is required to be significantly thinner than the thickness of the vapor deposition film 12.

As a method of reducing the inclined surface film 13, the mask sheet 2a is made thin so that the mask 2 and the substrate 1 are brought into close contact with each other, whereby the deposition material 3c being deposited is introduced. You can think of preventing this. However, when the mask sheet 2a is thinned, the strength is lowered, so that an accurate opening cannot be formed, or the mask sheet 2a may be broken during handling of the mask 2. Therefore, in the present invention, diffusion of the deposition material 3c from the injection nozzle 33 is prevented, and the deposition material 3c is restricted from entering the substrate 1 at an angle.

In the vacuum atmosphere, when the vapor deposition material 3c is injected from the spray nozzle 33, if the temperature of the vapor deposition material 3c is a certain high temperature, the average free stroke becomes long and hardly reaches the opening, It is considered that the opening reaches the axis of the spray nozzle 33 with an intensity distribution that is substantially axisymmetric. Therefore, when there is nothing restricting the movement of the deposition material 3c around the injection nozzle 33, the deposition material 3c is scattered in all directions.

On the other hand, when the diffusion prevention plates 31 and 32 were disposed above and below the injection nozzle 33, it was confirmed that at least the diffusion in the vertical direction was suppressed. Since spaces are formed between the vapor deposition film lines in the vertical direction, the mixing with other colors is not conceivable. Therefore, the diffusion barrier plate 34 is also provided in the lateral direction to exclude the influence of the adjacent injection nozzles 33 and the influence of the injection nozzles 33 at spaced positions, thereby limiting the incidence into the opening. have.

Since the injection nozzle 33 has a diameter of, for example, 5 to 15 mm, it is inevitably arranged in the width direction. Therefore, conventionally, the vapor deposition film 12 was aimed at by reaching the more openings arrange | positioned in the width direction by the vapor deposition material 3c sprayed from one injection nozzle 33. As shown in FIG. As a result, it turned out that the film | membrane 13 of inclined surface shape is formed by the vapor deposition material 3c which obliquely enters the opening. In particular, when the deposition material 3c is incident from the spray nozzle 33 spaced apart from the spray nozzle 33 closest to the opening, the incident angle becomes small, and the likelihood of becoming the inclined surface film 13 becomes high.

Therefore, in the present invention, only the deposition material 3c injected from the spray nozzle 33 as close as possible to the opening reaches the opening, thereby suppressing the occurrence of the inclined surface film 13. Therefore, the horizontal diffusion prevention plate 34 is provided between each injection nozzle 33.

On the other hand, in the above embodiment, the spray nozzles are arranged in the horizontal direction, and the evaporation source is moved in the vertical direction. However, the present invention can of course be applied even when the spray nozzles are arranged in the vertical direction and the evaporation source is moved in the horizontal direction. have. Furthermore, in the above description, the substrate of the organic EL device has been described as an example, but the present invention can also be applied to a film forming apparatus and a film forming method for performing a deposition process having the same background as the organic EL device.

1: substrate
2: mask
3: evaporation source
3a: heater
3b: crucible
3c: deposition material
3d: heat dissipation means
3e: housing
4: means of transportation
5: motor
6: vacuum exhaust means
7: substrate holding means
8: mask holding means
9: vacuum chamber
12: vapor deposition film
13: film of slope shape
31: upper diffusion barrier plate (first diffusion barrier plate)
32: lower diffusion prevention plate (first diffusion prevention plate)
33: spray nozzle
34: horizontal diffusion prevention plate (second diffusion prevention plate)
35: evaporation unit
100: vacuum deposition apparatus.

Claims (5)

A vacuum deposition apparatus for heating and depositing an evaporation material housed in an evaporation source to form a deposition film having a predetermined pattern through a mask on a substrate, wherein the evaporation source is a crucible and guides the evaporation material stored in the crucible to a substrate. It has a plurality of injection nozzles, these injection nozzles are arranged in a line, the first diffusion prevention plate disposed on both sides of the injection nozzle row, the second diffusion prevention plate disposed between each injection nozzle, and the evaporation source A vacuum vapor deposition apparatus characterized by providing a moving means for moving the. The method of claim 1,
The spray nozzle row extends in a horizontal direction, and the moving device moves the evaporation source in a vertical direction. An evaporation source containing vapor deposition materials, which is used in a vacuum vapor deposition apparatus for forming a vapor deposition film of a predetermined pattern through a mask on a substrate, comprising: a crucible and a plurality of spray nozzles for guiding the vaporization materials stored in the crucible to a substrate; The spray nozzles are arranged in a row, and include a first diffusion barrier plate disposed on both sides of the spray nozzle row, and a second diffusion barrier plate disposed between each spray nozzle. Evaporation source used. The method of claim 3,
An evaporation source for use in a vacuum vapor deposition apparatus, wherein the pitch between the nozzles in the nozzle row is wide at the center and narrow at both ends. The method of claim 3,
An evaporation source for use in a vacuum deposition apparatus, characterized in that the pitch between the nozzles in the nozzle row is equal pitch.

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