Patent ID: 6135868
Filing Date: 2000-10-24
Classification: B24B

Abstract:
A conditioning assembly for conditioning a pad for polishing semiconductor wafers comprising:a conditioner comprising:a surface comprising a disk having one or more diamond crystals embedded therein, for roughening the pad surface;a brush which surrounds the diamond embedded disk, the brush having a plurality of bristles for deterring slurry from compacting in surface features of the pad;wherein the bristles are sized so as to easily fit within the surface features of the pad, and are sufficiently stiff so as to remove slurry particles from the surface features;a holder; anda spring loaded mechanism, operatively coupled to the holder,and further wherein the conditioner is operatively coupled to the holder, and the brush is operatively coupled to the spring loaded mechanism, such that the spring loading mechanism causes a pad contacting surface of the brush to project beyond a pad contacting surface of the conditioner when in an unenergized stated.