Etching Silicon with Plasma - Reactive Ion Etching (RIE)

/ szeloof
OUTLINE:
0:00 - intro
1:10 - chamber overview
2:26 - etch demo
3:58 - demo results
5:40 - endpoint detection
7:37 - quirks, subtleties, safety
10:39 - construction
Music is shanghai by king gizzard and the lizard wizard

[@alihouadef5539]

When a KZbinr (with all due respect, that you deserve) have a better fab than your university.

[@Maxjoker98]

Awesome as always. This is probably KZbin's most underrated channel - Who else could claim they have a chipfab at home *and* is making great KZbin videos. Keep it up!

[@arianagm2332]

Please share who is making chipfab at home and making bad KZbin videos! Thanks!!! 🤣

[@RM360CR]

Here we go with the underrated comments OK how can something you like be underrated also not alot people are going to be interested in plasma etching so you can only consider something underrated if you are waaay to concern on what other think about you and there is a name for that sort of people.

[@rakinkazi9780]

This guy will singlehandedly solve ongoing the chip shortage.

[@Roxor128]

Only if he gets a lot of other people following his lead!

[@HouseMusicLover001]

​@@Roxor128I'm in, I got hooked by semiconductor manufacturing

[@HuygensOptics]

Thanks Sam for yet another great video with a lot of high-quality info. About working cleanly: I found it to be really difficult to get to an acceptable particle level in a garage. But for proof of principle, it is really not that big of a problem. If you put a lot of devices on a wafer, there is generally always one that works! Cheers.

[@thomasnoble5268]

How many device do you fit on a wafer in your garage?

[@prakharmishra3000]

Companies run out of chips due to shortage This guy: Imma make my own in the garage

[@SamZeloof]

First

[@kentvandervelden]

First like

[@Joemama555]

lolz!

[@LightningHelix101]

You have taken the highest seat for yourself

[@nathan584]

This is so incredible ur making ic's in ur garage and it's insane

[@JoaoBarbosa1996]

This is ridiculously awesome. Not even at work, our RIE has endpoint detection...nor did I knew that was a thing. Absolutely amazing work

[@Finlaymacnab]

Recommend scrubbing the exhaust gas. Heaven forbid somebody gets a good whiff of it. If you're looking for a new project, I think interference lithography might interest you. It can generate metamaterials with features sizes of around 100nm. With multi-beam setups the possibilities are endless. Meta optics are fascinating. You're a super lucky guy to have so much gear! Where do you get it all?

[@lynspyre]

Awesome to see you still working on silicon etching. Your videos are great!.

[@gsuberland]

Really nice work! Good to hear about some of the intricacies and quirks that you had to work around. A lot of places cover the overview of the process and the successful routes, but it's rare to hear about all the little details and implementation issues that crop up along the way.

[@Piipolinoo]

Dude, amazing project, amazing video! I'm so happy to have found your channel and I couldn't be more envious about your lab :) Keep up the amazing work!

[@jotapeuve]

Dude... I had never heard of you before. I ended up here because I was looking for some explanation of how RIE works and your video just blew my mind. I never thought someone could be that resourcefull. I'll stick around. Thank you so much for the effort you put into this and keep it up!

[@paulodpereira]

It's nice to see a new video. I feared you gave up on this.

[@poptartmcjelly7054]

a man does not simply give up after building a home chip fab.

[@dougabugg]

Yes! This is SUPER exciting, can't wait to see what you make in the future!

[@LightningHelix101]

This is your 3rd coolest vid imo. The initial transistor doping and the Op amp will be hard ones to beat, but your editing and focus on reproducibility were on point. Machined parts >> salvaged parts. Makes it feel way more sustainable

[@s.stefan6257]

being an electrical engineering student and watching Sam is a real inspiration and motivation source

[@ecxone87]

Been working on multimillion $ etchers for a long time this is cool as hell. You will make a company very happy one day and fill your walls with patents.

[@joewiseguy1159]

I've been doing my own research on the chip shortage, and thought surely there is here someone building chips at home here in the states.... Tada 🎉 ! I'm just starting to learn about fab process and your videos are a great help ! I will definitely be visiting your Patreon . Keep up the good work.

[@CRAZEERUSKEE]

Phenomenal work, and awesome to see a new video/update!

[@rafusy]

Thank you Sam, I can’t wait for the next video!

[@bignope5720]

alright, how long until you start taking orders? i have some ASIC designs to try out..

[@user-ub2do3bt5h]

Me too need to start to compete with Broadcom and Mellanox (NVidia now)

[@HouseMusicLover001]

@me in a couple of years, I plan on doing the same thing as him

[@erikburman530]

Absolutely amazing!

[@Cas1O]

Not only awesome engineering, but very clear explanation + video content. Sam was right, before the explanation all the hardware was intimidating. After the explanation, far more interesting than intimidating! I love the fact that Sam went into some of the sourcing and build details. I'd be interested in a companion video about how Sam arrived at his design and what the mental and research process for sourcing the hardware and equipment. I imagine a lot was incremental and I'm interested in that process.

[@pawel23467]

Sam you knowledge is incredible

[@ajodom10]

I've been browsing through your videos and truly admire your talent and passion. Would love to see more and I'll definitely be contributing to your new patreon. Please keep up the great work and continue to share. Let me know if I can help in any way.

[@jonathanrodriguez2245]

Great video. I'm interviewing for a semifab position doing dry etch and for studding this helped me alot!

[@g.d.8065]

That idea to etch until a certain spectrum line reaches a certain level for consistency seems roughly equivalent to "bake until golden brown".

[@Martinit0]

More like "bake until it smells right"

[@sashimanu]

“Bake until golden brown” seems to be another viable means of endpoint detection by use of optical interferometry to determine feature thickness

[@BarbellBinks]

this "bake until golden brown" is actually a very frequently used method to endpoint etch process steps :)

[@cylosgarage]

Spectacular work as usual 👍

[@squelchedotter]

Wow, this really is some serious stuff now. I'm half expecting the next video to be a clean-room ;)

[@Ant0ine64]

I always like watching a new video of the styropyro looking guy doing some applied science stuff with plasma vacuum and big science gear

[@raymondwright]

Dude that's amasing Never thought that it is possible to make plasma etching in a garage

[@Michael-bh9ss]

Just started to work in a fab and.... all those particles from your breath onto those poor wafers!!!! Aweaome setup! Keep it going!

[@BarbellBinks]

luckily, garage projects don't require contamination free manufacturing :)

[@nicolasriva7605]

Impressionnant !👍 Nico from France

[@ClemoVernandez]

Good stuff man. Keep up the good work

[@md.fazlayrubby2869]

that's simply an awesome video. thanks for your effort.

[@tigeruby]

always love the Zeloof drops 🌿👽🌿

[@aeonikus1]

Not to confuse with drops that Zoloft makes :D

[@lukaskirschnick8185]

Thats awesome, I just stumbeld upon your channel and I love it!

[@DEtchells]

Envious of your entire setup, but I *love* that ‘scope! 🤤 (I’m most envious of your energy level though, as evidenced by the massive amount of work and focus you’ve put into the whole lab! 👍😄) (I was surprised to learn that a diaphragm gauge could be sensitive enough to be accurate at such low pressures. I guess the capacitive sensing can accurately measure very small deflections though. Really interesting too, that you have to use *aluminum* for the chamber. Makes sense because Al2O3 is pretty hard to tear apart, but it never would have occurred to me, as we always used stainless for everything when I used to work on vacuum systems back in the day.)

[@Shreyam_io]

great work sam, you remind me of the Applied Science channel...

[@cantsolvesudokus]

That’s cool how the magnet interacts with the plasma!

[@asoto1516]

So cool, love these videos!

[@andrewprice8439]

Keep up the good work, Sam.

[@SteveAB4EL]

If this doesn't work out, you could switch goals to laying down teflon coatings on frying pans.

[@AmitKumar-li2zq]

I am very excited to see a real microcontroller from your fab

[@maxwellconniff1189]

lol, I wish you luck on that ThorLabs sponsorship. You definitely deserve it.

[@ahmedsaeed8751]

This boy Will have a great impact in humanity in the future

[@ajinkyamahajan102]

Appreciate your work

[@khoanguyen5805]

Wow! I wish i know you earlier .Thanks for sharing

[@meroramo8179]

Bro, You are a legend

[@CapitanZeppelin]

SUBSCRIBED AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT

[@flatpanel22]

Great geek video. Thank you!

[@yafitbenivgi7291]

King gizz background music - nice touch👌

[@douro20]

CF4 is also used as a low-temperature refrigerant gas (R-14). Large amounts of it are produced as a byproduct of aluminium refining using cryolite.

[@corwinweber693]

Nice setup. I'm actually interested in coming at this from another direction. 3d printing on this scale with various materials using plasma sputtering. Still trying to work out the details on how it would work, and hoping to find some way to do it that doesn't involve doing it in a vacuum.

[@FXGreggan.]

Neat setup, been working with DRIE for some time... fun stuff :)

[@lilblackduc7312]

Very good, Sam! Thank you...🇺🇸 😎👍☕

[@campbellmorrison8540]

WOW. OMG where do you get all this stuff, love it! obviously you have a very supportive Dad, fantastic!

[@AndrewZonenberg]

Have you considered scrubbing exhaust before venting it outside, just to be a good neighbor? Not that you're producing a large amount of gaseous waste but polluting less is always good.

[@SamZeloof]

Yeah I’d like to build a burn-box, basically pass the exhaust thru a quartz tube that’s at like 1000C and it decomposes everything

[@PedroDaGr8]

@@SamZeloof That should do OK to break things down pretty well. Simply running your gas through wet NaOH will do a good job at scrubbing HF and other reactive fluorides: NaOH + HF --> NaF + H2O. To take care of F2, adding sodium sulphite will help improve efficiency. Alternately, the use of a solution of Ca(OH)2 has the benefit that it precipitates the fluoride as a harmless CaF2 salt.

[@salmoncatt]

I’ve kept wanting to do this but I’m too lazy, thanks for making this content

[@user-fy9ow6nu1r]

Отличная работа! Скажи, ты плазменную установку делал из нержавейки? И можно ли на ней напылять золото на мембраны для конденсаторных микрофонов?

[@bryanbrown9506]

how long until it can make an stm32 replacement?

[@BrotherCreamy]

Asking the important questions.

[@jbrownson]

Mind blowing

[@shis10]

Superb information

[@AlejandroJCura]

Can't wait till we all have one of this in our garages, printing SID chips to resuscitate Commodore 64s.

[@whatthefunction9140]

Your channle is so under rated

[@roger_isaksson]

Nice DIY high tech hobbyist semiconductor operation. ☺️👍👍

[@Knax4747]

great stuff keep it up

[@Zeynel_Guler]

Sam is my new idol :)

[@nonmaisbon]

Hey that's really impressive !! I'm used to "state of the art" DRIE reactors and I can tell you did a very good job... Well to be honest you should build a gas scrubber to avoid throwing everything into the atmosphere, but otherwise it's much WOW.

[@Kalanchoe1]

thats some cool tech!

[@mooreanalytical4105]

Man, how many times to you have to try and chase a leak in these systems. I bet it’s a real pain. Loved the video!

[@Ikxi]

Damn this is so cool!! One tip for when you are talking to the camera: Have more of your upper body in frame, generally looks better. And then you could include more gesturing. An example would be Tom Scott videos (specifically the language ones). Those are very good.

[@Nono-hk3is]

Very impressive

[@__-nd4hf]

Did you measure the etching speed? It is usually the point of competition on the industrial RIE machines, wonder how comparable is that. Also, how is the surface uniformity? Had quite a time with spikes on etched surface with GaN, probably Si is much better with that.

[@heyarno]

That is quite impressive equipment. Have you considered etching a microchannel plate and building your own image intensifier tubes?

[@shinyguy3766]

the plasma universe is awesome

[@BreakingTaps]

Outstanding work as always, always a huge inspiration to watch! I had previously assumed RIE would be too complicated, with too many nasty gasses involved, to be done at home. Clearly I was wrong! Surprisingly simple setup and seems very doable as long as you have enough knowledge to e.g. not blow up the pump. Really great stuff :) Is the glovebox just for chemical containment, or does it also double as a clean box (filtered air, etc)? Edit: oh, what's the etch rate like? nm/s?

[@SamZeloof]

Thanks i always enjoy when you make a new vid too! Really want an AFM, I tried to buy an ICSPI probe to build a custom controller but they refunded the order I guess because they dont want people doing that. RIE is super doable at home, all the gasses here are safe (SF6, CHF3, CF4), I think its just the ones to etch metals (HBr or Cl2 for aluminum etch) that are really bad. Etch rate is approx. 100nm/min. The glovebox is just a fume hood but i would like to add filters and positive pressure

[@BreakingTaps]

​@@SamZeloof 😂 Haha yeah, I could see them not wanting that. :) Lemme know if you ever want something scanned, happy to help out! I have it pretty permanently setup on my desk now so it's easy to pop a sample on to scan. Where do you go about finding SF6 et al? I suspect my local welding place doesn't carry more esoteric gasses like that :( And that's pretty fast etching all things considered! I assume the depth is mostly limited by how quickly the photoresist is chewed up? Any plans to try DRIE? Bosch process doesn't seem too much extra work, albeit another gas to track down (and probably a lot of nuance in the details, nothing ends up being easy :) )

[@dandan-gf4jk]

@@BreakingTaps Is SF6 strictly required? I remember looking through doi.org/10.1117/12.2266715 and there is no mention of it so it might be possible to do without it. It's somewhat easy to synthesize CHF3 and to a lesser extent CF4 using HF. Don't you have a chemistry background? Maybe it's time for another change in your content :P

[@BreakingTaps]

@@dandan-gf4jk Interesting! Not sure, I'm only vaguely aware of the details to be honest (never looked too closely, assuming it would be too hard to do at home :) ). Will do some reading! And my background is in cell biology, so just enough chemistry to know I'm quite bad at it haha. 😇

[@dandan-gf4jk]

@@BreakingTaps Well you're not alone in that thinking as fluorine chemistry isn't exactly the friendliest (especially to an amateur). But a quick look at wikipedia, SM, and patents should give you a good idea about what is possible and what isn't. That said most patents for SF6 required unobtanium catalysts and working with SF4, the alternative being burning stochoimetric amounts of sulfur and elemental fluorine, haha. CHF3 is by far the easiest, I'll give it a go myself and my chemistry background is nonexistent so you should be good.

[@dinushkam2444]

Great stuff...

[@elipaster1969]

This is so fricking cool

[@youtubeaccount4762]

WOW Its Amazing...and that stuff at home.

[@ofcourseofcoursebutmaybe]

so dope

[@apaskiewicz]

WOW... That's the only word that came to mind.

[@davidsiriani9586]

You are wonderful! Thank you for the good explanations of this technology, how did you print the photoresist in such tiny patterns?

[@oliverer3]

I'd imagine he is using some form of photolithography

[@thetruthexperiment]

Sick music! When the plasma moves with the magnets, are the particles flowing or… what?

[@Skunkhunt_42]

Whats the RF for? Great content btw, next Applied Science- i can see it now

[@SamZeloof]

RF makes plasma

[@Skunkhunt_42]

@@SamZeloof oh dope! Thanks for saving me some googling! I work in high vac but not the realm of semiconductor. I see all the vendors selling RF stuff and never asked but been curious

[@Panjok7]

RF = radio frequency

[@jasonkocher3513]

Hi Sam... I have been planning for a vacuum setup at my one man R&D shop, just want to do sputtering, evaporation, and maybe some experimental carbide coatings with various process gasses. I'm also using a rougher pump with Fomblin. Have you had any issues with your "garage door" outgassing setup? I want to do the same thing, but I'm concerned the fire department or EPA will find issues with this. Any advice, knowledge, or things to watch out for in this area? I want to avoid installing an expensive reactor column, although I purchased a beat up Edwards reactor column with original intentions of getting it running. I'd rather not invest the time and would just want to vent to the outside of the building. I'd only be doing occasional random experiments, and not production. Thanks!

[@jimzielinski946]

Amazing work. Would you be willing to sell some of your etched silicon specimens? I've been able to look at quite a few finished chips under a microscope, but i'm curious to see what a freshly etched surface looks like.

[@sealpiercing8476]

The window kind of looks like it's mounted backwards (CF flange with knife edge facing out). Is it? If so, why? You've got an o-ring there, so you don't need both knife edges I suppose--is it just to make the fiber holder easier to mount?

[@ablasttv]

Is there a name for the metal components which make up your vacuum chamber? (The metal tubes, windows, and connectors which bolt together) It seems like some sort of standard pieces you could pickup in standard sizes for any project. Or do you machine them custom?

[@pup4301]

More in a few month please!

[@BarbellBinks]

How often do you replace the consumable parts? I get it's certainly not high volume manufacturing, but I'd be worried if those o rings weren't swapped out every so often

[@andrewphillip8432]

Dang that is cool.

[@oghry]

I hope you can fix the global semiconductor shortage soon 😁

[@TheSlyMouse]

Nice video

[@Me-ld8bt]

Dang... you have a DIC microscope, a mass spectrometer and a whole lot of other cool things. Cool project anyhow!

[@Bianchi77]

Did you make the plasma machine yourself ? Very cool. Nice video, thanks :)

[@zachariahcandelaria9005]

After seeing this, I would want to see a video on carbon vapor deposition (cvd)!

[@GirthWindFire]

Question. We use non-reactive gas in the etcher at my job. Would you be able to get the same thing to happen with argon? Also the mass spec is incredible.

[@rollbot]

cool stuff! wish I could come hang out and learn from you! --- have you ever thought about building a cyclotron or linear accelerator?