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A u t o m a t i o n o f s e m i -c o n d u c t o r f a b r i c a t i o nThe prospect of increased y ie lds,rather than just labour cost savings,w i l l spu r Europe ' s semiconduc to rindus t r y to spend he av i l y onau tomat ion ha rdware and so f twarethrough the decade. Accord ing to arepor t f rom Fros t ~S u l l i va n , g row thin these expe ndi ture s wi l l increase incons tan t -do l la r te rms a t a compoundrate of 40,3% per annum between1986 and 1990 . A subsequen tf la t tening in sa les is expected toresul t in a rate of only 27.7% for thewho le o f the fo recas t pe riod , 1986 to1993, covered in the study. 'Theau tomated semiconduc to r wa fe rfabr icat ion market in Europe' .In absolute terms, the marketappears sma l l , g rowing f rom on ly$12 .1 mi l l i on es t ima ted fo r 1986 to aforecast $66.9 mi l l ion in 1993; th is isroughly a tenth of the s ize of the USmarket.However , the repor t says thatEurope 's impor tance in the wor ldw idemo v e me n t t o s e mi c o n d u c to rfabr icat ion automat ion is far greaterthan the numbers would suggest . Thecooperat ive research pro jects whichEuropean governmen ts underwr i te toensure that European automat ionexper imen ts w i l l become pub l i c muchmore qu ick ly than those in the USA,where an t i - t rus t laws con f ine suchinves t iga t ions w i th in ind iv idua lcorporat ions. Europe has thusbecome a tes t marke t tha t i s be ingwatched c lose ly a round the wor ld .Tw o par t i cu la r p ro jec ts tha t a reexamined by the s tudy in the i r ro le ast rendse tte rs a re the S ieme ns-Ph i l ips'Megach ip ' p ro jec t and the UK A lveyAMT jo in t p ro jec t .In the key product area of g lobalfac to ry m anagement sys tems, therepor t no tes tha t the number o fsuppl iers has shrunk recent ly f romha l f a dozen to jus t two- -Cons i l iumInc, and Promis group of I .P. SharpAssociates. This in turn has g ivenDig i ta l Equ ipment Corp anunexpec ted m onopo ly in ha rdware .Frost ~ Sul l ivan Ltd, Sul l ivanHouse, 4 Grosvenor Gardens,L o n d o n , SW l W 0 D H , U K

R o t a r y e n c o d e r u s e s l a s e rThe com pac t ro ta ry encoderannounced by Canon uses laser beamdif f ract ion to provide an accuracy ofup to 1 arcsec. The rotat ing e lementhas 20 250 s l i t s w i th w id th s o f1.4/~m. The semiconductor laserbeam is d iv ided and sen t th rough twosymmetr ica l s l i ts in the grat ing d isc.The resul t ing beams are ref lected andon ly the f i r s t o rde r d i f f rac ted beamsdetected. This resul ts in 81 000 wavepulses per revolut ion being produced,wh ich when e lec t ron ica l l y subd iv idedby 16 g ives the accuracy of 1 arcsecper pulse.The cons t ruc t ion a l lows sh i f t s inwave leng ths to a ce r ta in ex ten t andcan p reven t the sh i f t s f rom hav ing aneffect on measured values. Theincident laser is d i rected at twosymm et r ica l spo ts on a l ine f rom thecentre of the d isc in order to absorbeccentr ic er rors caused by therotat ion of the d isc. This processrequires an increase of componentsused, bu t the com pany com pensa tedfo r th is by dev is ing su i tab ly shapedpar ts and opt imiz ing theirar rangement, thus min imiz ing the s izeof the encoder.Two types o f encoder a reava i lab le , one p roduc ing a s inuso ida lou tpu t and the o the r a square wave .The s ine wave a l lows de tec t ion o ftwo d irect ions, and the square waveenab les easy d iv is ion by up to 16 .The ou ts ide d iamete r o f the un i t i son ly 36 mm.App l ica t ion s a re expec ted assensors in robots, NC machines andsurvey ing equ ipment .Canon Europe NV., Industr ia lProduc ts D iv is ion , Un i t 3 , Bren tTrading Centre, Nor th Circu lar Road,London , NW l0 0JF, UK

A s phe r ic a l l e ns produc t ionMass p roduc t ion o f an aspher ica lp last ic lens, used in v ideo product ion,has been star ted by Matsushi taElectr ic Industr ia l Co. The lens isshor ter than convent ional ones due toa spec ia l d iaphragm w h ich sc reensou t unwan ted l igh t and the

es tab l i shment o f advanced lensdes ign techn iques fo r de te rmin ing thebes t comb ina t ion o f lens andd iaphragms.Th e c o mp a n y d e v e l o p e d t w otypes of th is pro ject ion lens, one is an'a i r coup l ing ' t ype wh ich has a i rbetween the CRT and the lens, andthe o the r i s an ' op t i ca l coup l ing ' t ypewhich has a c lear mater ia l in thespace between the CRT and the lensin order to improve contrast . Toassure temperature stabi l i ty , bothhave 'hybr ids ' us ing two aspher ica lp last ics lenses and one spher ica lg lass lens. This s imple construct ion,th rough a h igh ly re f rac ti ve convex b i -aspherica l lens and a d iaphragm ,g ives the lens compac tness and h ighper formance at the same t ime. For

examp le , the company a i r - coup l ingtype pro ject ion lens has an overa l llength of 121 mm (compared to1 65 mm for exist in g g lass lenses and1 61 mm for exist in g p las t ic lenses),and as far as per formanc e isconcerned, i t has a 20% higheramb ien t l igh t ra t io than f lex ib lelenses, and an F-number of 1.0.Matsush i ta E lec t ri c Indus t r ia l CoLtd, 1006, Kadoma, Kadoma City,Osaka, Japan

C o m b i n a t i o n m e a s u r e m e n tf i x t u r eDes igned fo r measur ing mu l t ip led imens ions s im u l taneous ly , thecomb ina t ion measurement fi x tu re fo rcy l ind r ica l componen ts f rom C.E.Johansson can be opera ted manua l lyo r au tomat ica l l y w i th a bu i l t - inp rogrammab le log ic con t ro l le r. I t canbe qu ick ly se t up fo r hand l ing a rangeo f workp ieces in an FMS o rp roduc t ion ce l l env i ronment . Fo rpos t -p rocess gaug ing in au tomat icp roduc t ion app l i ca t ions , a robo t o ro the r equ ipme nt can be used fo rwork load ing and un load ing .Gaug ing is ca r r ied ou t w i thgroups of preset t ransducers mountedon in terchangeable backplates, incon junc t ion w i th a new Metem ser ies250 co lumn ind ica to r w i th da tastorage faci l i t ies. W ith the a id of aremote d isp lay te rmina l , the ind ica to rcan be p rogrammed fo r measur ing upto 18 d imens ions on each o f amax imum o f 12 componen ts .Wi th the Metem sys tem,inspec t ion da ta f rom the co lum nind ica to r can be down- loaded to acomputer system for stat is t ica lana lys is and o the r managem ent

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