A Straightforward Approach to Introduce FDC-Methods for Wet-Process-Equipment

In this paper the benefits from introducing FDC- methods for the monitoring of wet-chemistry batch- processors will be outlined. As an example, a typical spray-process equipment shall be used to demonstrate the benefits of using fault detection and classification. These include monitoring of process parameters and frequency of equipment alarms and as result indicating the current state of the equipment. Batch processors usually have a high throughput and in the case of wet-chemistry equipment the process result may be monitored only indirectly. This makes the knowledge about the state of the equipment obligatory for minimizing scrap. Aim of FDC-methods is detecting tool degrading through recording and interpreting the process-parameters during every run and, if necessary, triggering preventive maintenance. Process engineers, maintenance engineers and the equipment operator need to have all the information they need for their decisions delivered in a way they can easily access. To achieve this, Infineon Technologies has implemented various software-tools which all share the same date-base.